


through the sleepless night

by skyparents



Series: this slope is treacherous, this daydream [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Ocean's 8 (2018)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Harry Potter Setting, Alternate Universe - Hogwarts, Angst and Romance, Claude Becker is an asshole in all universes, Coming of Age, Debbie is an idiot, Debbie is still an idiot though, F/F, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, How do they pass their classes?, Most of the Harry Potter characters are very minor/background characters, Nobody ever gets enough sleep, Post-Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Secret Relationship, Slow Burn, Tammy always has good advice, That's the Entire Plot, You could probably call it one of those stories
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-27
Updated: 2019-09-01
Packaged: 2020-02-07 06:26:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 21
Words: 68,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18614986
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skyparents/pseuds/skyparents
Summary: she wonders what makes debbie come here. she doesn’t think she’d want to take this place away from someone else, not if sitting up here at night heals little parts of debbie deep down, too. “maybe we’ve just been here on different nights,” tammy suggests, offering the other girl a small smile. it’s not returned, and she isn’t even sure whether debbie saw it to begin with; she’s still looking straight ahead, over the top of the lake into the mountains. “we can share it. the spot, i mean.” debbie doesn’t answer, but she nods, nearly imperceptibly.or, the ocean's 8 ladies go to hogwarts. in which debbie and tammy are part of decidedly separate social circles, until they discover they have a lot more in common than they thought.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> or, the ocean's 8 ladies go to hogwarts. in which debbie and tammy are part of social circles that rarely, if ever, get along. only it turns out they both go to the top of the same tower at night when they can't think, and they've just so happened to miss each other for the past several years. cut to the end of fifth year – when, instead of turning away upon finding tammy at the top of that tower, debbie simply sits down next to her.
> 
> okay, here we go. this is the first thing i've written for debtam, or ocean's 8, and also happens to be the biggest project i've ever taken on in the fic-writing world. i'm really excited about it and have several documents and excel spreadsheets to plan things out, and i hope you like it as much as i do! we're going to go ahead and dedicate this whole fic to maria for making me ship these two idiots and putting up with all the drama and angst i've been putting her through for months while this has been in progress. also, to my sister, emma, for helping me work out so damn many plot details. y'all are the best, and i love you.

There are certain places designed for the peaceful kind of silence. For the camaraderie involved in being quiet somewhere, together. For being alone but maybe not entirely, for being able to hear yourself think, for grounding yourself to something that feels solid. Like the top of the highest tower after curfew, like sitting under a tree twenty paces into the woods, like sunrise at the beach and two o’clock in the morning and the deepest, farthest corner of a bookstore.

And libraries. Like the one on the second floor of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, where Deborah Eloise Ocean occupies an entire table all on her own, having spread her books out across its surface in a sort of mosaic. The only sounds are pages turning, people breathing, quills scratching on parchment, the smallest whispers.

Okay, scratch that. There’s another sound, and it’s shoes clicking purposefully on the floor in her direction.

Her best friend drops unceremoniously into the seat opposite hers, crosses her arms over her chest, and stares at her intently with one eyebrow raised until it becomes evident that the heavy transfiguration textbook laid out on the table is winning the battle. Then she takes on another tactic – which, evidently, is to simply  _ annoy _ Debbie into paying attention to her. “Deb.  _ Deb.” _ She reaches out to close one of the textbooks and Debbie counters by pointedly flipping it back open again. “Come out and watch our practice.”

“I’m busy, Lou,” she says shortly, a dramatic sigh on her lips already. “Besides, Claude’s going to be there, and I’m already set up here.” She’s been doing  _ quite well _ at avoiding him since the breakup in March, just like she spent the last few days of Easter break steadfastly refusing to talk to her parents about him. She glances up just in time to see Lou’s nose wrinkle at the mention of him, but she doesn’t linger on the subject. “I’m studying. It’s our  _ OWLs, _ they’re important. They’re going to shape our whole future.” She sounds like she’s quoting her father, and she might as well be; he recites things like that enough for her to have committed them to memory.

“You don’t even  _ need _ to study for transfiguration,” objects Lou, brushing her bangs out of the way to roll her eyes. She’s forever doing that, like she’s worried Debbie will miss it otherwise. It’s easy to tell that she’s not going to drop this until Debbie follows her downstairs and into the grounds, but she doesn’t plan on giving in so easily. Lou nudges at Debbie’s foot with the toe of her shoe under the table. “I bet she’d cut you some slack. It’s not like she’s going to fail you.”

Sighing, Debbie rolls her eyes right back at the blonde. “She’s not going to go easy on me just because I’m her daughter, that’s completely unethical,” she protests. Which is only half the point Lou is trying to make, she thinks, because transfiguration is her best subject and she’s not exactly in danger of failing, regardless. Still, she fixes the other girl with as serious a stare as she can muster right now, and Lou takes advantage of her momentary distraction, snatching up the textbook and holding it tauntingly out of reach. The only silver lining is that she keeps Debbie’s page marked with her thumb, backing up a couple of steps.  _ “Lou,” _ hisses Debbie, already up on her feet to make a futile grab for it.

Lou grins, spinning on her heel. “If you want it, come and get it,” she tosses over her shoulder, entirely too loudly for a library. She doesn’t seem to care that people are narrowing their eyes in her direction, that she’s shushed as she passes the librarian’s desk. Lou Miller doesn’t tend to let anyone tell her what to do, except maybe Debbie, and even then, only sometimes. “The fresh air is good for you, and the others will be down there, too. You don’t have to talk to Becker, and you can make Nine quiz you.”

Cursing under her breath, Debbie gathers up her other books, shoves them into her bag, and hurries out of the library after her.

Technically, she could sit stubbornly at her table and study something  _ else, _ but the truth is, transfiguration is the one weighing most heavily on her mind. The rest of her OWLs are going to be stressful enough, trying to pull high enough marks to please her parents and set her up to follow in her father’s footsteps to the Ministry of Magic – but disappointing Caroline Ocean as a student  _ and _ a daughter? That’s not exactly an option. Her mother is equal parts supportive and intimidating, and Debbie has no intention of letting her down.

She catches up to Lou on the staircase, finally slowing to adjust the way her bag hangs from her shoulder so that its weight isn’t hitting the backs of her knees and making her gait lopsided. “You’re the worst,” she says when she’s caught her breath.

Lou only smiles. “You love it.” She doesn’t pass the textbook back, keeps a tight hold on it instead like she’s worried Debbie will make a break for it the second she’s got it back in her hands. Constance and Nine-Ball fall in on either side of them as they push out into the sunshine and head around the side of the castle, matching the lengths of their strides to each other with the practiced air of people who no longer have to focus on doing so. Lou and Constance trade off the items they carry, Lou’s broom for Debbie’s textbook, the smaller girl nearly losing the page but managing to keep it marked in the end.

“You’re late, Charlotte,” says Daphne Kluger loftily when they reach the Quidditch pitch, and Lou visibly bristles. This reaction is probably exactly why Daphne keeps calling her by her first name instead of the chopped-up middle one, knowing it will get her teammate riled up right off the bat. It’s always said  _ just so, _ smug and innocent all at once, with that wide-eyed, deer-like look that the girl perfected way back in first year when the two of them discovered just how thoroughly they don’t like each other.

There’s tension building in Lou’s shoulders already. “One day, I’m going to kill that girl,” she mumbles before she steps onto the pitch.

Claude is watching her like a hawk, and Debbie meets his gaze coldly for a full three seconds, counting them mentally before she allows herself to turn away. She trails after Constance and Nine to the bleachers, sidestepping around Daphne’s friends as she goes.

They don’t mix, the two groups. This is primarily because of the Slytherin girls’ rivalry, the constant negative energy crackling between Lou and Daphne. They got along for maybe half a year before their competitive natures got the best of them, and Debbie unquestioningly chose her side right from the beginning. She’s known Lou since before Hogwarts, in that way that many pureblood children know each other solely because of their parents’ social circles, except that Debbie and Lou  _ clicked _ better. They are kindred spirits, Debbie thinks, offbeat and rebellious, slightly-crooked puzzle pieces not quite fitting in with their families in the way they are meant to. Unconventional Lou and her rejection of the name her parents gave her, the ever-present push-back on what they want. She purposefully cuts her hair herself because her mother doesn’t like the bangs, has set her sights on becoming a professional Quidditch player even though her father thinks it’s a waste of time. Her bravery is inspiring, though Debbie doesn’t feel as confident in her own rebellion. It’s enough that she dons red and gold every morning instead of green and silver. She was eleven the first time she got a taste of disappointing her father, and she’d rather like to avoid more of that. So she is more subtle about it, sticks to the smaller things when it comes to the parts her parents see, like taking Care of Magical Creatures as an elective just because it’s interesting, or breaking up with a boy who they have always expected her to end up with in the long run.

It wasn’t long before they formed their own found family, a handful of misfits who have no particular interest in trying to blend in. Like Constance Hong, loud and opinionated and perhaps a little sticky-fingered, clinging to Debbie from day one when they claimed the beds next to each other in their Gryffindor dormitory. And Nine-Ball Stevenson (nobody can get away with calling her Leslie, except her little sister), a Muggleborn Ravenclaw picking up on everything magical with near-frightening speed. And Debbie, and Lou.

Daphne Kluger is a solo ringleader, less willing to share the spotlight. She chose quieter people to surround herself with, people content to let her lead the way. The closest thing she has to a second-in-command is her girlfriend, Rose Weil, a sixth-year Hufflepuff mother-hen type with unruly curls and big glasses. Then there’s the prefects: Tammy Prescott, Ravenclaw, the quiet and more sure-footed one, and Amita Chandra, Hufflepuff, perhaps less confident but making up for it with an endless stream of chatter most of the time. She’s talking animatedly to Rose now, head tipped back so the sun warms her face, as Debbie moves around them to get to the bleachers.

Daphne has zeroed in on Constance as she takes a seat and finally hands Debbie’s textbook back to her, narrowing her hazel eyes in that unimpressed, Kluger-trademarked fashion. “She can’t be here,” she frowns, crossing her arms. “She might take information back to her team.”

“Oh, please. What’s a Seeker going to get on us? Besides, you’ve got Prescott.” Lou’s arm sweeps in a wide arc to gesture in the direction of Daphne’s friends, sitting on the edge of the pitch. “I’m pretty sure a Keeper’s a little more dangerous. Have you already told her what hoops you’re going to take shots on?”

Frown deepening, Daphne shakes her head. “She’s not even paying attention.” It’s true – Tammy is sitting cross-legged in the grass, leaning forward to stick her nose in a textbook lying open in front of her, mouth moving to silently form the words as she reads them. She doesn’t seem to register hardly anything around her: Not her name, the eyes on her, the stream of words Amita is still spouting a foot away from her.

Cutting in smoothly before Lou can answer, Constance raises her hands in a surrender. “Relax, it’s fine. I won’t look. Cross my heart and hope to die,” she promises, deadpan, and promptly turns her back on the pitch, facing Debbie and Nine-Ball. There are no further arguments to be made, and Daphne opens her mouth and then closes it again, and the Slytherin team’s practice begins.

And it’s all going very well, until it happens.

Debbie is only half paying attention, letting her friends quiz her and each other on the course material, flipping pages forward and back again. But she sees Lou fumble, distantly sees her friend’s dismayed expression as a Bludger sails directly in Daphne’s direction. Then it all escalates very quickly: The hit, and Daphne with the wind knocked out of her, losing grip on her broom handle for a moment but managing to stay on the thing until she and the rest of the team reach the ground.

_ “Miller!” _ she snaps, voice rising so it rings sharply across to where Debbie sits. She dismounts awkwardly, stumbling a little in the aftermath of the Bludger. “You did that on purpose!”

Lou lands more smoothly, swings her bat nonchalantly. “I did not,” she says unconvincingly. The point of that tone is to ensure that every person who might hear it  _ knows _ it’s a lie, and she looks just mischievous enough that anyone with eyes and ears should be able to put the pieces together. Debbie watches interestedly, certain that she knows the other girl well enough to be able to acknowledge the truth – that it  _ was _ an accident. There is no other explanation for the stricken panic that flitted across Lou’s face when she realized where that Bludger was being directed.

But Daphne doesn’t know Lou as well as Debbie does, and Lou is determined not to admit it, and so she just shrugs. Spinning outraged to their team captain, Daphne allows her voice to rise, shrill and clear and sharp, drawing the attention of everyone in earshot. Rose is up on her feet, trying to place a calming hand on the girl’s shoulder, to no avail. Even Tammy is drawn out of her textbook by the noise, a slight frown drawing at her eyebrows.

Their captain looks downright exhausted, which is only to be expected. He’s been dealing with the two of them for far too long to be unaffected. Maybe they pull it together during actual games, but the rest of the time is pretty much a nightmare. Debbie only hears one-sided stories of the things going on in the Slytherin common room and dormitories, but she thinks if she were Marcus, she’d be on the verge of snapping, too. “All right, all right. Practice is over! I’m calling it!” He waves his hands, exasperated, and wheels around to Lou. “Apologize,” he orders.

Debbie steps onto the pitch, purposefully, as if she belongs there. She doesn’t; she’s never been good on a broom, is firmly of the opinion that Quidditch is sort of overrated. Her dad used to play, is pictured grinning in Slytherin robes in a cabinet up in the castle, and she likes to think that has no bearing on her thoughts on the matter at all, which is probably a lie. By the time she reaches Lou, the blonde has crossed her arms over her chest and, with a deep frown, muttered an apology  _ just _ sincere enough to keep Marcus from benching her for Saturday’s game. Debbie reaches for Lou’s elbow and tugs her towards the edge of the field. “C’mon, let’s go.” She doesn’t leave room for argument, only releasing her when they’re halfway back to the castle with Constance and Nine-Ball in tow.

All in all, the Slytherin team’s Quidditch practice is not the most productive of places to have gone to study. Debbie doesn’t say this aloud to Lou, who’s already on edge enough after that practice, and she doesn’t pry about the Bludger incident, either. The girl is dead-set on allowing everyone to think that she did, in fact, send that Bludger at Daphne on purpose. Just because Debbie is  _ mostly _ certain that’s a lie, doesn’t mean talking to Lou about it will be even remotely helpful. Instead, she focuses on distraction, insisting that they sit out by the lake, and her textbooks sit untouched next to her until dinner.

Someone taps on her shoulder in the Great Hall and she tenses, but it’s only a second-year Hufflepuff. “Um, Professor Ocean wanted me to give you a message,” he says, a little apprehensively. “She’d like to see you in her office after you’re finished eating.”

And then he melts away, leaving Debbie to spin in her seat to search her mother out at the staff table. The woman is deep in conversation with Professor Lupin on her left, and doesn’t seem to feel her daughter’s eyes on her at all. Either that, or she’s simply got enough willpower to  _ pretend _ she doesn’t. Heaving a sigh, Debbie turns back to her food and rolls her eyes across the table at Constance. “Isn’t that ridiculous?  _ Summoning _ me like that? Like she couldn’t just ask me herself?” she asks, but she’s not really looking for an answer.

On her way out of the Great Hall, Danny jogs a few steps to catch up to her. “Hey, little sister. Quidditch team is barely even looking at each other, what do you know?”

“Lou hit Daphne with a Bludger,” she answers absently, letting Constance climb the stairs ahead of her. Her brother stands a few inches taller than her in his Slytherin robes, hands in his pockets, always the picture of confidence. His NEWTs are coming up, and he doesn’t even look worried. Danny never lets his outsides be affected by his insides; Debbie sometimes thinks she still has room for improvement in that area. She glances around for one of his ever-present friends, but he’s alone. “Did Mum call you up to her office, too?”

He shakes his head. “Nah. Good luck, kiddo. I’m going to go find Tess.” He ruffles her hair and hurries off, fully ignoring her frown as she combs her fingers over her hair to flatten it down again.

As she heads for her mother’s office, something inside her feels like it deflates.

Of  _ course _ it’s only her tonight. Danny is not the one her parents are concerned about – that’s Debbie, has been all along. They were supportive enough, but not exactly pleased, when the Sorting Hat placed her in Gryffindor instead of following in the Oceans’ Slytherin legacy. Her mother is less dead-set than her father is on shaping her into a better person, Debbie  _ thinks,  _ but they like to present a united front as parents, and with one of them at Hogwarts constantly to keep an eye on her, it’s easy to feel like there is a pressure weighing on her constantly. Sometimes she wonders if Danny feels that pressure, too, or if he’s simply better at living up to the expectations set in place for him.

She beats her mother there, waits outside the locked office door for a minute or two before the woman sweeps down the corridor. “Deborah,” she says smoothly, waving her wand at the lock on the door. “Come in, sit down.” She waits pointedly until Debbie is seated in the chair opposite her desk, and leans against the edge of the furniture to look down at her curiously. “How’s your studying going?”

“Good, it’s good,” Debbie lies. She’s been  _ trying,  _ but it’s hard to focus, and every time she gets in the proper mindset to pay attention, Lou or Constance or Nine shows up with a little bit of chaos in their wake, and she is drawn away. This is probably why her father isn’t a huge fan of any of them – Lou, the only pureblood, has the biggest shot at his approval, but has a thing for shattering the expectations people have for her. There’s something about it that opens her up, lets her breathe easier. Would it be like that for Debbie, if she felt ready to fight back, too?

Her mother doesn’t look as if she completely believes her, but she lets it slide. This is the key difference between her parents; Elijah Ocean is rarely, if ever, inclined to  _ let things slide, _ where Caroline is more lenient. She watches as Debbie twists her fingers together in her lap and doesn’t elaborate, and maybe something about that picture makes something in her soften, because all she does is nod and say, “All right.”

But she glances meaningfully out her office window until Debbie follows her gaze, and this vantage point offers a glimpse of one corner of the Quidditch pitch, and  _ oh, _ Debbie shouldn’t have lied. 

“Debbie, honey.” Leaning forward, she puts their faces on the same level so she can look Debbie very seriously in the eyes. She looks  _ tired. _ “I know your OWLs don’t start for almost a month and it feels like you’ve got all the time in the world to prepare for them right now. And Merlin knows you’ve got enough going on, between school and your friends and” – here, she hesitates briefly – “breaking up with Claude and, well, being sixteen. But these exams are important, especially if you want to go into the Ministry like your father. Which means you need to put in the time to study, every day. Limit those distractions.”

These words echo in Debbie’s head for the rest of the evening.

They run on a loop when she tries to think, rendering studying pretty much useless, and when she finally crawls into her bed, they fill the gaps between Constance’s quiet snores and project themselves onto the ceiling. Just past midnight, she throws her covers back and slips her shoes back on, shrugging a big, soft sweater over her shoulders as she heads for the door. There is one place in the castle where she can always hear herself think, without fail, where she goes when she cannot sleep. Where everything always seems to dwindle until it no longer matters, even if it’s only for a little while.

Sneaking out of the Gryffindor common room and tiptoeing past the portrait of the sleeping Fat Lady is hardly difficult at all, anymore. Debbie has done this a hundred times, is well-practiced in it. She ghosts down the corridors and staircases until she reaches the base of the astronomy tower, climbs the spiral stairs inside until she reaches her destination. Her spot, where she has been coming on nights she can’t sleep for five years – only tonight, there is something different about it. Something unexpected.

Tonight, there is somebody else here.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> she should probably be studying right now, but she doesn’t know if she can focus. they were learning incendio in charms, today. the fire-making spell. tammy tried to sleep already, but it didn’t last long. all that played on the insides of her eyelids when she drifted off were images of sparks flying, flames licking their way up all the walls.
> 
> so she’s followed the now-familiar path down the stairs from her dormitory, along the corridors, up into the astronomy tower, and she sits at the edge with her feet hanging off into the open air through the railing. she picks absentmindedly at a loose thread on the hem of her sleeve. and when she’s been there for twenty minutes, she hears it.
> 
> footsteps, climbing purposefully up the stairs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> here we go, guys, they're about to actually interact. this is crazy. also, introducing tammy's perspective, because this is probably going to switch back and forth every chapter.
> 
> i'm hoping to stick to a weekly posting schedule, but i find if i get too strict with myself, it just makes it hard to write and keep up with – i just get too stressed! so let's say ...roughly every week. ish.

She can’t sleep.

She discovered the astronomy tower in second year. Or, technically, in first year, but discovering a place like this by attending a weekly class there is rather different from discovering it all on her own. There’s a quiet serenity to it, the top of this tallest tower with stars blinking down from overhead, after the night’s classes have come to a close. She stumbled upon it mostly by accident, in the cold winter after her father’s death, when she kept waking up from dreams filled with flames.

Sneaking out after curfew isn’t something that Tamara Maria Prescott  _ does, _ typically. But something vital changed in her over Christmas break that year, and perhaps she’ll never be the same as she used to be. The first night that she crept out of Ravenclaw Tower, she wandered around the castle aimlessly. Putting one foot in front of the other felt like methodically chasing the nightmares out of her head, and so she kept going, and going, and going. And eventually, she reached the top of a tower where she could look out at the rolling hills surrounding Hogwarts, and it made her feel like maybe she was healing. Just a little bit.

So the next night, she went back.

This year, after she pinned a shiny prefect’s badge onto her robes, it’s been easier to get here. She doesn’t have to steal through the shadows and edge around corners anymore; she can walk purposefully from one end of the castle to the other at midnight without anyone batting an eye at her. It feels a little like cheating, to do this, but sometimes she just needs to climb the stairs to the top of the astronomy tower and sit there for a while, see the stars, hear the hushed sounds of nighttime when everyone else has their eyes closed. It’s cathartic, to escape whatever needs escaping from. The nightmares that still linger in the depths of her subconscious, or the stress about her upcoming OWLs, or the worry hanging over her like a cloud since she went home for Easter.

Her mother changed after they lost her father, too. Like something broke. The house feels a little bit too big when Tammy comes back for breaks, and she can’t even imagine how empty it must seem when she isn’t there, either. She thought about not going back, for third year – a Muggle public school would mean afternoons, nights, weekends, with her mother, so that she wouldn’t have to be alone – but her mum wouldn’t hear of it. Put her foot down and her voice sounded stronger than it had in weeks (months?), so Tammy let herself board the train on the first day of September, in the end.

She likes to spend as much time as she can with her mum, when there’s no school. And when she’s at Hogwarts, they write to each other constantly; she gets a letter tied carefully to her owl’s leg twice a week, sometimes three times. They write even when there’s nothing particularly exciting to be written. But maybe some things get left out. Like how when Tammy went home for Easter this year, the house felt different all over again. Her mother lit candles instead of turning on the lights. There was less food in the kitchen and a pile of bills on the counter that hadn’t been paid yet, and none of Tammy’s questions got real answers.

Maybe that’s part of the reason why her upcoming OWLs are occupying her thoughts so heavily. Academic success has always been important to her, since day one, but now there’s an extra layer to it. Because the OWLs will determine what classes she can take for her last two years at Hogwarts, and then the NEWTs in seventh year will lay out her entire future for her. If she can get a good job, she can help her mother pay the bills, turn the lights back on, make sure everything is  _ okay. _ It’s just that getting there is unimaginably difficult, and Tammy has been studying to the point of near-obsession since returning to the castle at the beginning of April, and she  _ still _ doesn’t feel ready.

She should probably be studying right now, curled up in an armchair in the Ravenclaw common room with her potions textbook, but she doesn’t know if she can focus.

They were learning  _ Incendio _ in charms, today. The fire-making spell.

Tammy tried to sleep already, but it didn’t last long. All that played on the insides of her eyelids when she drifted off were images of sparks flying, flames licking their way up all the walls in the building where her father died trying to save the people who lived there.

So she’s followed the now-familiar path down the stairs from her dormitory, along the corridors, up into the astronomy tower, and she sits at the edge with her feet hanging off into the open air through the railing. She picks absentmindedly at a loose thread on the hem of her sleeve. And when she’s been there for twenty minutes, she hears it.

Footsteps, climbing purposefully up the stairs.

She isn’t exactly sure what she expects. Maybe Professor Reyes, having left something behind after the third-year class finished their star charts. Or maybe Tess, who’s always incredibly diligent when she’s on patrol, which is probably why she was made Head Girl this year. Stiffening momentarily, Tammy readies herself to explain precisely why she is up here, staring out at the stars, when she’s not actually scheduled on patrol and there is nobody left to patrol  _ here, _ anyway.

It’s all proven unnecessary when the newcomer reaches the top of the staircase and steps out into the open, though, and it turns out to be Debbie Ocean.

For a moment, they just look at each other, wide-eyed. Tammy wonders if they’re both thinking the same thing: She could get Debbie in trouble, right now, if she wanted to. Dock points from Gryffindor, dole out a detention or two, get some sort of misguided revenge for what Lou Miller did to Daphne during Quidditch practice earlier. The girl has no real defence for being out past curfew, wearing pyjama pants and a thick knitted cardigan, up at the top of the astronomy tower when she should be sound asleep. She  _ should _ lose house points, at the very least.

But Tammy doesn’t say a word, and after a moment, Debbie takes a step forward. She pulls the edges of her sweater closer together and quietly sits down two feet to Tammy’s left, pointedly looking straight ahead. Tammy imagines a clock ticking, counting the seconds until one of them breaks the silence. It’s Debbie who does it, in the end.

“This is my spot, you know.” She says it mildly, like she’s talking about the weather.

Tammy glances sideways.  _ Her _ spot? She’s been coming here – irregularly, but frequently enough – for over three years now, and she’s never seen another person up here, not once. She’s still fiddling with that loose thread, and she twists her fingers so it snaps away from the fabric entirely. “I’ve been coming here since second year,” she answers.

If there’s one thing she’s learned about Debbie Ocean over the last five years of seeing her from a distance, across classrooms and down corridors, it’s that she does not often let whatever’s going on inside her head to make it up to the surface. Her brother doesn’t, either, and while their mother is perhaps softer, she carries that same energy in her bones. Tammy has never seen Elijah Ocean in person, but she’s seen pictures of him in the Daily Prophet, and he’s got that cool, detached confidence seeping out of every pore, too. Maybe it’s something that runs in the family, and you have to look closer to catch a glimpse of anything lingering underneath it. Like now, how she’s close enough to see just the slightest frown tug at Debbie’s face. “Me, too,” she says, shrugging. Her sweater slips off one shoulder a little, and she doesn’t make a move to fix it.

She wonders what makes Debbie come here.  She doesn’t think she’d want to take this place away from someone else, not if sitting up here at night heals little parts of Debbie deep down, too.

“Maybe we’ve just been here on different nights,” Tammy suggests, offering the other girl a small smile. It’s not returned, and she isn’t even sure whether Debbie saw it to begin with; she’s still looking straight ahead, over the top of the lake into the mountains. Hesitating, Tammy tests words on her tongue silently until the quiet feels like it’s stretched on for too long. “We can share it,” she ends up saying, a little awkwardly and rather belatedly. “The spot, I mean.”

Debbie doesn’t answer, but she nods, nearly imperceptibly.

After that, they don’t say anything at all. Just sit there, side by side, with their gazes fixed ahead of them. Sometimes, silences like this are tense and unpleasant, but this one feels different. She doesn’t feel the compulsive need to break it, which doesn’t make any sense at all because they aren’t friends. They haven’t spent time together even once before. How is it that this feels, somehow, inexplicably, comfortable? Tammy doesn’t know what time it is when she finally moves to stand up; her clothes rustle against each other, the first real sound of the hour, and she’s almost to the top of the stairs when Debbie’s voice, quiet but sure of herself, makes her pause.

“Are you going to tell, or take points or something?” she asks. When Tammy turns, Debbie has twisted around, still seated, to look at her curiously. There’s something else in her eyes, too, something that she can’t quite figure out how to label. Maybe a little bit apprehensive, maybe a little bit daring. She doesn’t exactly know Debbie well enough to tell, for sure. And yet, unbidden, the thought creeps into her head that maybe she  _ could. _ She pushes it away (it’s late, she’s tired, that’s all, right?) and shakes her head, and Debbie’s mouth turns up at the corners, just a little. “Okay. Thanks.”

When Tammy gets back to her dormitory and tiptoes past Nine-Ball’s bed to climb into her own, she pulls her covers up to her chin and closes her eyes and all she can see is that tiny glimmer of a smile.

She doesn’t quite know what to make of that.

In the morning, Amita waves her over to the Hufflepuff table. This is something that Tammy’s friends and Debbie’s friends have in common: The complete and total disregard for sitting in house-segregated tables at mealtimes. As a prefect, Tammy feels a pang of guilt for setting this example, so she doesn’t always join them, but today, she slides into an empty seat and wills herself not to look up at the staff table. If she makes eye contact with a professor, any single one of them, she knows she will feel uncomfortable enough to rush back to the Ravenclaw table.

Instead, she finds herself scanning the Gryffindor table. There is a fifty-percent chance that Debbie’s friends are there this morning; they are prone to choosing either Gryffindor or Slytherin, for their unofficial leaders. She locates them easily enough, her attention drawn by Constance Hong’s loud and distinctive voice standing out above the rest of the student body’s low rumble of noise. Her gaze lingers on Debbie briefly across the Great Hall. Dark hair, dark eyes, shoulders held back, poised as always. She’s leaning one shoulder against Lou as Constance speaks animatedly, the plate in front of her untouched. She looks tired, maybe, or is that Tammy’s imagination? She wonders how late Debbie stayed up at the top of the astronomy tower before sneaking back to her common room.

Daphne follows her sightline fleetingly and shakes her head. “Miller one-hundred-percent sent that Bludger at me on purpose,” she says with a long-suffering sigh. “I  _ cannot _ believe Marcus is going to let her play on Saturday. That was the most bullshit apology I’ve ever seen in my  _ life.” _

Across the room, Debbie glances at Tammy, only for a moment. Nothing in her face changes as they look at each other, and then she breaks eye contact and looks back to Constance. For some unknown reason, Tammy has been holding her breath, and she releases it in a soft  _ whoosh _ as she tries to focus in on her friends’ conversation again.

The owls swoop in from above to drop letters down into waiting hands, and Storm lands in front of her as gracefully as an owl can land on a table filled with food. She unties the letter methodically, unfurls the paper and flattens it out on the tabletop in front of her, scans the first sentence, and freezes.  _ Dear Tammy, _ it reads.  _ I didn’t want to have to break this news in this way, but it’s not fair for me to put off telling you that I’ve lost my job. _ Her mother fills the rest of the paper, double-sided, with optimism. How it’s nobody’s fault, really, and how helpful her best friend, Nadine, has been, and how she’s already looking for another job. Tammy’s heart sinks with every word; she tries to read between the lines for what her mum is actually thinking. She tries to picture it in her mind: Her mum sitting at the kitchen table, tapping her ballpoint pen on the wood as she tries to think of the right words to convey to her daughter that she’s  _ okay. _ Is she? Or is it a lie?

Rose reaches across her girlfriend to poke at Tammy’s arm. “You okay?” she asks, frowning.

Tammy folds her mum’s letter in half, quarters, eighths, and tucks it into the pocket of her robes out of sight, nodding. “Yeah. Yes, I’m okay.” She reaches for her half-eaten bagel, but it tastes stale suddenly. She’s known since Easter that her mother’s money is dwindling; one salary doesn’t go nearly as far as two, and maybe she’s had to cut into the savings without Tammy’s father’s income to supplement her own. But  _ this _ – God, this makes it feel a thousand times more real.

She can’t focus all day. Her thoughts loom over her, casting shadows, drowning out her teachers’ words in each class. How long has it been since her mother found herself unemployed?  _ It’s not fair for me to put off telling you, _ she wrote. How long has she been putting it off? Tammy wants to shut herself in a quiet room to write back, but she doesn’t know what to say. And besides, there’s no time. She has classes straight through from breakfast until dinner, and homework assignments for everything, and then there’s prep for her OWLs, on top of everything else. She would welcome the distraction, if she could only concentrate properly.

In the common room, she sets up camp in her favourite armchair in the corner, spreading her books over the low coffee table in front of her. She studies  _ with _ Nine-Ball in the vaguest sense of the word; maybe they are not friends, specifically, but they have the sort of solidarity that two Muggleborn Ravenclaw girls require in order to function. It’s not official, more like sitting  _ near _ each other with their textbooks open, occasionally speaking to ask a question or clarify a concept – a smooth-running, unspoken system they have grown into by this point. Some nights, when she has a big assignment to work on, Nine-Ball’s little sister joins them, though the older girl is constantly nudging the other one to head to bed at a reasonable time. Ronnie is only a second-year, but Tammy thinks that the Stevenson girls possess a rare type of intelligence, the kind that could enable them to take over the world if they wanted to.

Tonight, her head feels like it’s spinning, and she can’t even keep up with them. Relatively early on, before Nine-Ball even starts to drop heavy hints for Ronnie about what time it is, Tammy snaps her potions book shut and rolls up her half-finished essay methodically. It’s not getting anywhere, anyway. “I’m going to bed,” she announces, but she can’t sleep. Again. She tosses and turns until the rest of the fifth-year girls come in and crawl into their own beds, and then she pulls out a quill and parchment.  _ “Lumos.” _

The tip of her wand lights up, brightness stretching around the room. Nine-Ball groans and puts her pillow over her head. “Turn that shit off,” she mumbles.

“Sorry,” Tammy whispers back, ducking underneath her covers. With the light from her wand contained, she tries to fashion some sort of response back to her mother, but she can’t get any further than four pathetic little words.  _ Dear Mum, I’m sorry. _

At one o’clock, she gives up and makes her way to the astronomy tower again.

She doesn’t really expect Debbie to be there, but when she makes it to the top of the stairs, there she is: Sitting in the same place as last night, with another thick sweater on, hair falling in dark waves down her back. She doesn’t turn to look when Tammy steps out into the open, only laces her fingers together smoothly in her lap as Tammy sits down. Two feet to Debbie’s right, carefully maintaining the exact amount of distance that was settled on yesterday. What is it, she wonders, drawing Debbie out of Gryffindor Tower to come here two nights in the row? What things occupy her thoughts when she can’t fall asleep? What worries does this spot chase away for her? 

She doesn’t ask, though. Debbie speaks up first again, like they’re repeating steps they’ve already been through with only a few key elements changed. “Can’t sleep again?”

Tammy shakes her head. Without her permission, words bubble up and into the open. “My mum lost her job,” she tells Debbie and the stars. She doesn’t know why. “She’s a librarian. Or she was.” She wraps her arms around herself, although it’s nearly June now and the night air is warm enough to be comfortable. “She didn’t say why it happened or anything, but I’m… worried about her, I guess. It’s been really hard for her since – since my dad died.”

It’s quiet for a moment, and she thinks perhaps Debbie isn’t going to say anything at all. Why should she? They aren’t friends, just two people who have discovered they’ve been stealing away to the same hiding place without realizing it. But just when she’s accepted that fact, Debbie clears her throat and says, “Shit, yeah. What was that, third year?”

“Second,” amends Tammy quietly. Feeling a little reassured, a little bolder, she lets her voice grow just a touch stronger now. “I almost didn’t come back for third.”

Debbie glances at her swiftly. “Really? What would you have done, gone to a Muggle school?” Even now, years after the Second Wizarding War, Tammy has learned that many people – purebloods, especially – say that like something dirty.  _ Muggle. _ Debbie doesn’t, though. In her voice, it’s only a word. When she nods, the other girl tilts her head to the side, gaze searching Tammy’s with something akin to wonder. Or is that something she’s imagining, too? “You have magic, though. I can’t even fathom ever giving that up.”

Sometimes, Tammy gets stuck on that, too, unsure how she could have ever thought that she could let this facet of her life go once she’d had a taste of it. “I just didn’t want my mum to have to be alone,” she explains, shrugging her shoulders. “I’m glad she didn’t let me do it, though. My dad always really loved the idea of… all of this. He’d always ask me a million questions about it, wanted to know pretty much everything. I studied really hard first year so I could answer as many of them as I could.” This is, likely, where the extra pressure for academic success came from; she laid out those expectations all on her own, wove them into the fabric of herself until they were all but impossible to separate. “Maybe even with him gone, I just want to make him proud of me.”

“I get that. I mean, not exactly. But it makes sense.” Turning her head back to face forward, Debbie starts talking, like maybe it’s okay now that Tammy’s gone first. “My dad’s in the Wizengamot. Department of Magical Law Enforcement. I’m going to end up there, too.” It sounds hollow, like the empty kind of promise. Like maybe she doesn’t know whether or not she’s the one making that call. Debbie’s words come slowly, hesitantly, gathering momentum a little as she goes. Maybe it’s easier for her to talk when she’s not looking directly at someone. “And obviously my mum’s here, so. She’s on my back about OWLs. They’re going to define my whole future or… whatever.” She looks sideways at Tammy momentarily, and there’s that little glimmer of a smile again. “You’re lucky you’re, like, really smart. You’ve probably got your OWLs in the bag. E’s all across the board.”

Tammy shifts uncomfortably. “You’re really smart, too, though,” she points out. When Debbie only gives a soft, disbelieving snort, she fixes her gaze seriously on the girl’s side profile. Follows the straight line of her nose, the slope of her cheekbones. Her eyes are framed by long, dark eyelashes, and her mouth is set carefully in a line. Tammy frowns and insists, “I know you get good grades. I bet you’ll do just fine on your OWLs.”

“It doesn’t just happen naturally for me, though. Not like it does for people like you. Or my brother.” Debbie runs her fingers through her hair, shakes them free so that it falls back to partially obscure her face from view. “Did you know I’m the only Ocean to not get sorted into Slytherin? Like, ever.”

Tammy shakes her head before realizing that the defensive curtain of Debbie’s hair means she can’t see it. “No, I didn’t,” she answers, a little belatedly, because the other girl seems to be waiting for a proper answer. Is that another thing they have in common, besides the place where they’re sitting? Debbie is the only Gryffindor in her family, and Tammy is the only witch in hers. They stick out when you look at them closely.

Debbie nods, hair shifting so Tammy can see her eyes again. They flicker up to look at the stars, maybe pinpointing one in particular. “Maybe that’s why I feel like I have to work so hard.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> on the first day of summer vacation, debbie unpacks her trunk. this is not a notable activity until a slip of parchment falls out of the pocket of a sweater and flutters softly to the floor. she looks at it for a moment and then picks it up, and all that’s there is an address. no name, just the street and city. and on the back, three words: "just in case."
> 
> she should throw the note away. she does, actually. almost. except that an hour later, she snags the parchment back out of the trash and tucks it carefully into the centre drawer of her desk. just in case.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> here's to hoping y'all don't mind getting this chapter a couple days early, because i have no self-control!

They begin to grow familiar with each other, throughout the last few weeks before summer officially begins, in their secret shared place in the dead of night. Oddly, there is something comforting about this. At first, Debbie was certain it would be an absolute nightmare, entirely awkward, uncomfortable. She’s been hovering on the borders of actually  _ knowing _ Tammy Prescott since they were eleven years old, and she doesn’t think they’ve actually spoken to each other properly before, not once. And now they’re sitting in the Great Hall amidst the scratches of many quills and the shuffle of many pieces of parchment, writing their very last exam of fifth year, and she can see Tammy’s blonde hair braided back and tied with a soft blue ribbon three rows ahead of her, and they’ve had maybe a dozen real conversations. Change is evident all around, now.

Somehow, Tammy is easy to talk to. Debbie doesn’t think that she has ever experienced this level of simplicity in knowing anyone at all, besides maybe Lou; even Constance and Nine-Ball took untold amounts of time to reach  _ this _ point.

But they only speak in one place. The top of the astronomy tower, with the night sky stretched wide above them, sitting side by side with their feet hanging out through the railings. That two-foot gap has lessened just slightly, but there is still a distance there, and Debbie can sometimes only string her words together into something that makes sense if she’s not looking directly at the other girl. Anywhere else – seeing each other at mealtimes or passing each other in corridors or glancing at each other very briefly across a classroom – it’s different. They don’t talk, there. It’s as if nothing has changed at all, except that Debbie has begun to expect that Tammy might be there when she sneaks up to the tower. Once, Debbie falls asleep for real and doesn’t go at all; another night, Tammy doesn’t show. It doesn’t matter. There’s a string of four nights in a row that they both wind up there, and that makes up for it.

They share a lot, more than Debbie thinks she would willingly share with people elsewhere. They talk about small, inconsequential things: How Tammy’s favourite teacher is Professor Weasley and how Debbie’s is Professor Longbottom, and how exhilarated Tammy felt when Ravenclaw beat Slytherin in the Quidditch Cup finals even though Daphne feigned anger for a full twenty-four hours. They talk about the medium things like which subjects are making their exam anxiety peak, and then there are the big things. Like how Tammy feels like she’s forgetting important things about her dad every day that he’s gone, and how sometimes there’s something in Debbie’s father’s eyes that scares her, just a little bit. Like how they both feel small sometimes, like they don’t quite fit anywhere just right. It’s hard to figure out  _ how, _ but there is a level of quiet, unhurried understanding between them that Debbie would never have expected.

Out in the Entrance Hall, when she files out of the exam with with the taste of summer in the air, her mother takes her by surprise. Hugs her right there in front of every student in her year, throwing all pretense of not giving Debbie special treatment to the wind. “I’m proud of you,” she says, at just the right volume for Debbie to hear without anyone else catching the words. It warms something deep in Debbie’s soul. She hesitates for a moment and then lifts her arms to hug her mother back.

— • —

On the first day of summer vacation, Debbie unpacks her trunk. This is not a notable activity until a slip of parchment falls out of the pocket of a sweater and flutters softly to the floor. She looks at it for a moment and then picks it up, and all that’s there is an address. No name, just the street and city. And on the back, three words:  _ Just in case. _

Debbie looks back to the sweater she’s dropped onto the foot of her bed. Is that the one she wore the last night she climbed the steps of the astronomy tower?

She should throw the note away. She does, actually. Almost. Except that an hour later, she snags the parchment back out of the trash and tucks it carefully into the centre drawer of her desk. Just in case. And then she forgets about it.

There is too much going on, anyway. Danny and Tess have graduated, have jobs lined up to start in September but are going traveling first. They want to see America, roam from one coast to the other hand-in-hand, before they settle into their respective Ministry careers. Debbie watches her father’s chest swell with pride at the whole thing, hugs her brother fleetingly before he leaves, resigns herself to living underneath her parents’ watchful eyes all summer long.

But the next night, everything falls apart. Her parents sit her down in the living room and tell her, calm and collected, that her mother is sick. It feels like her entire life is built from wooden blocks and someone has slid out one from the bottom, one of the pieces supporting the rest. Everything Debbie knows is teetering dangerously close to collapsing.

They told Danny before they told her, before he left England with Tess. Told him to go anyway, only it gets bad sooner than anyone expects. There was supposed to be more  _ time.  _

Debbie spends the last two weeks of July at St Mungo’s, living off the food from the cafeteria and sneaking some of it upstairs for her mum, even though the Healers shake their heads and recite all the reasons that she should be eating the healthy food wheeled into her room on a cart instead. But wizards and witches have no magical cure for stage-four cancer; if they did, they would have shared it with the Muggles by now. If time is running out, then why does it matter what type of food she eats?

It’s better during the hours when her dad is at work. He can’t get the time off, not even for this, and she wrote a letter to Danny but it’s taking what feels like a million years to get to him because he’s so damn far away. And so it’s mostly just the two of them: Debbie and her mother. She is well-versed in the art of pulling herself together on the outside, puts on a good front for anyone who looks her way. And for herself, too. If she lets herself think about it for too long, she worries something on her outsides will crack. The nurses keep calling her  _ strong,  _ and it feels like a lie.

Her friends come to visit, Lou tugging Constance and Nine-Ball in her wake when she sweeps into the room in that commanding way she does that makes it feel like she belongs here. “How’re you feeling, Professor O?” asks Constance, smiling at the woman like there’s nothing wrong. Like she’s not somehow towering over the woman simply because she can’t stand up anymore.

“I’m doing okay, Constance,” says Debbie’s mum, and they all let the lie slide. Nine-Ball has snuck in bags of junk food, and they spend the afternoon playing mindless card games in chairs drawn up around the bed, stashing the snacks by their feet when the Healers come in on their rounds as if that renders them invisible. It doesn’t work, not really, but nobody says anything. Debbie wonders if that’s just another hint shining a light on how bad it’s getting.

“Why didn’t you tell us earlier?” she asks later, after her friends have filed out of the room to head for home. She shuffles the deck of cards on the white sheets, just for something to do with her hands. The question has been weighing heavy on her shoulders since her parents told her the news, evidently  _ months _ after receiving the diagnosis.

Her mother sighs, reaching out to place a hand over Debbie’s, effectively stopping her from moving. She doesn’t have the heart to slide her hand away to keep fiddling with the playing cards. “We didn’t want to distract you,” she says. Her fingers are cold.

It makes sense, and Debbie nods, sure that she understands the implied meaning. “Right. My OWLs, Danny’s NEWTs.” School, grades, future careers: That’s what it always comes down to, in the end, right?

“Yes, and no,” her mum answers, cryptic as ever. She hesitates, looking at her daughter until Debbie, reluctantly, looks back. Very solemnly, she elaborates, “Your father wants to ensure you’ll be successful, both of you. Danny’s going to be an Auror and maybe you’ll go into the Ministry in some way, too.” It’s the first time Debbie thinks that word has ever been uttered in terms of her future:  _ Maybe. _ It sounds like possibilities. “Your studies are important, and I know you’ve worked very hard this year for your OWLs. You’re going to do big things one day, Deborah. I know that.” A pause, here, to allow this to sink in. And then, quieter but more weighted somehow, “I think maybe I just want you to be happy, too.”

— • —

Healer Radley blocks her way down the hallway on the last Tuesday of July. “I’m sorry, Miss Ocean, you can’t go in there right now,” he says, very seriously, all apologetic frowns behind his beard. And just like that, Debbie knows it’s happening. 

Time has run out, no sand left in the hourglass. That tower of wooden blocks making up Debbie’s life seems as if it’s swaying unsteadily, and she feels entirely out of control, like she’s watching things happen to her from afar. It’s an unfamiliar state to be in, and she doesn’t like it.

Danny and Tess get her letter, finally. Apparate in just barely too late, don’t get to say goodbye. She watches her brother’s face carefully, searching for a twist of emotion, but he keeps himself in check, and she wants to scream at him for it. If there’s ever going to be a moment for Danny to let himself go, she thinks this is it. How could it not be?

She doesn’t speak for seven days. She feels hollow inside. 

The funeral is sad in that emotionless, fragile sort of way that only the Oceans can truly pull off. People crowd into the church clad in all black and tell each other stories about her mother that she has never heard before. They circle around to tell anyone who will listen that they are sorry, like that fixes anything.  _ Thank you, _ her dad and Danny say, but Debbie doesn’t say anything, only nods. Lou sticks to her side like glue, and Constance brings flowers, and Nine-Ball doesn’t even bristle at the purebloods side-eying her like she doesn’t belong. None of them push her to talk to them, only brush their shoulders with hers occasionally all day so she knows they are there, and Debbie is eternally grateful for all three of them.

Her father goes back to work and the newspapers praise him for it:  _ Wizengamot member Elijah Ocean, standing strong in the face of losing his wife to cancer. _ Danny busies himself with moving into a flat in downtown London with Tess, throws himself into preparations to start his Auror training. Business-like, they begin to pack Caroline’s things into boxes. During the daylight hours, when Debbie occupies the house all on her own, she sneaks things back out of their new snugly-packed homes and stashes them in her room. A necklace here, a scarf there, a whole shelf full of books two at a time. She climbs out her window to sit on the sloped roof and reads them by moonlight, traces her fingers over the places where her mother would have turned the pages.

She feels overwhelmingly alone. The quiet empty spaces inside of her grow and swell and threaten to take her over entirely. This feels unlike her; if it were anything else changing, anything that isn’t like losing a piece of herself, she thinks she would be louder. Push more, fight more. But instead, it’s like she has been thrown all off-balance, nothing weighted properly now that her mother isn’t breathing anymore.

Nobody else understands this. Her friends try, but there is only so much sadness they can absorb out of her, and they can’t possibly know exactly what it feels like. The only person who could is Danny, and he is determined not to talk about it at all.

Halfway through August, Debbie remembers that there is someone else who knows what this is like.

It hits her suddenly in the middle of the night and she’s up out of her bed in a flash, pulling the scrap of parchment out of her desk and lighting the tip of her wand with a whispered word to squint at it.  _ Just in case, _ it says, and before Debbie can think about all the reasons not to do it, she’s tugged a scroll of parchment out to flatten it in front of her and is dipping a quill into ink.

_ Tammy, _ she writes, and the comma turns into a small smeared spot when she moves her hand across to start the first sentence.  _ My mum passed away two weeks ago. _ It’s a blunt beginning, no holding back, but the words are starting to flow now and Debbie thinks if she stops herself to try again and ease the other girl into the news, she won’t be able to start again.  _ It’s just like you said before, like something is broken. Maybe it’s me. I don’t know why I didn’t realize before how much she was holding me together. _

It’s not exactly a long letter by the time she signs her name at the bottom, but she sends it, anyway. Considers doing it by Muggle post to blend in better, but ends up tying it to her owl’s leg instead because she thinks if she waits until a post office opens to buy Muggle stamps, she’ll chicken out and not send it at all. Watching the barn owl spread her wings and take flight, silhouetted against a street lamp for a moment, feels good, somehow. Debbie gets back into bed feeling perhaps a little lighter.

The feeling disappears when Lilith returns the next night, carrying an envelope with Debbie’s name written neatly on the front. The letter is written in ballpoint pen on loose-leaf lined paper, the kind Muggle children fill binders with for school. It feels thin in comparison to the heavy quality that parchment has, but Tammy has written more than Debbie did, filled both sides of two sheets entirely. There are hundreds of nice words here, carefully printed out just for her, line upon line of them. Tammy reminisces about the things she’s learned from Debbie’s mother, tells her stories about her dad, lists things that helped her when she lost him. She has pressed forget-me-nots between the pages, their small blue petals preserved for Debbie to trace her fingertips over. She tries to imagine the other girl picking the flowers and writing this letter out, pictures the concentrated expression Tammy always has in class, and something twists near her heart.

At the bottom, Tammy has written her name, circling the tail of the Y into a spiraled flourish. And underneath that is a hasty postscript, like maybe she wasn’t going to add it but decided to at the very last moment.  _ PS: My mum and I are moving in a few days, so it’s sort of lucky that you wrote before the address changed, _ it says, and then a new street and house number. There’s a tiny smiley face next to it, and it makes Debbie’s mouth lift up at one corner for just a moment before a low buzz of panic sets into her bones and she shoves the letter into her desk, next to the slip of parchment with Tammy’s old address.

She doesn’t write back.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "unfortunately, we lost professor ocean over the summer,” she says, no tiptoeing around it, and tammy immediately searches debbie out. she almost expects to find the other girl with her head bowed down, dark hair obscuring her face from view – but debbie pointedly holds her chin up, gaze fixed unblinkingly on professor mcgonagall, a statuesque image of someone entirely unaffected by the mention of her mother.
> 
> but is she holding her breath?
> 
> she finds her gaze drawn back to the gryffindor table a few more times. debbie doesn’t seem to be looking back, but that’s not why she looks. all she can think about is how she felt, coming back to school again after her dad died. how lonely she was, and how numb everything went. she’s searching for cues in the way debbie holds herself, anything to piece together how the other girl is handling things. the lack of a letter back seemed like a telltale sign that it’s not particularly well, but she looks relatively okay, from afar.
> 
> maybe she’s simply better at moving forward than tammy ever was. or maybe she’s just good at pretending.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> me: should i post chapter 4 tonight?  
> maria: you know the answer to that.
> 
> anyway, it's sort of a short-ish chapter, but here you go! everyone thank maria.

Technically speaking, she doesn’t have the time to focus on whether or not she will write back. And yet, the thought lingers constantly, without permission, in the back of Tammy’s mind, lurking in the shadows, waiting to peek out at the least opportune of moments.

She is  _ busy. _ She is helping her mother pack, choosing what things to bring with them and what things to leave behind. Trying to decide which of their possessions should be sacrificed to the next people who own their house. Walking barefoot into each room to trail her fingers over all the places where her father lived, where she will never be able to set foot again. There’s the striped sofa in the living room that he always pretended to hate. There’s the burn mark on the floor in front of the stove where he dropped an entire casserole. He renovated one end of the hallway upstairs into a reading nook and filled its shelves with books for Tammy when she was eight. All of these spots will have no meaning to whoever comes next.

Her mother tried not to break eye contact with her, when she told her they couldn’t keep the house. It was a hushed conversation over breakfast a week after summer break started, and now it’s nearly the end. They can’t take everything, and they pack the backseat and trunk of the car with the most important and precious items. Her mum’s friend has a spacious guest room with a double bed and a pull-out sofa, and is clearing a corner of her basement so that they don’t have to let go of every single thing Tammy’s father ever touched. 

The house, with its square-shaped backyard, is deeper into suburbia, the type of building that looks just like every other one on its street. It does not stand out except that the front door is painted cherry-red. Two stories with a low stone wall in front, a brick chimney attached to a fireplace that is never used, a two-car garage and an extra spot at the side of the driveway that will belong to Tammy’s mother. It’s only a ten-minute drive away, but it feels like a whole lifetime.

“Just until we get back on our feet,” her mum reassures her before they get out of the car. “It’s temporary.”

Nadine answers the door and pulls Tammy’s mum into a tight hug immediately. She recruits her husband, Oliver, and her son, who’s Tammy’s age, to help carry their things inside. “You don’t lift a finger, Abby,” she insists as she sets a cup of tea in front of her. She’s always prepared, the kind of stable that revels in other peoples’ chaos. She smiles tensely at Tammy, not showing her teeth. “Tamara, would you mind getting your…  _ school things _ inside, out of the open?”

Because of course, now that they’re going to be living here, they had to tell her.

The last half of August is spent sleeping on the pull-out sofa in the guest room, mere feet away from her mother. Tammy spends a lot of time staring up at the ceiling instead of shutting her eyes and drifting off, but there is no tower to sneak up to, not here. She’s never quite gotten along with her mum’s best friend, has never had much in common with her kids, except maybe the oldest, and that’s a thing of the past, now. She thinks there’s been a disconnect since her dad died, at least, or maybe even longer. Because, on some level, Tammy is now her mum’s best friend, too, and if there’s one thing she knows about Nadine, it’s how competitive she can get. More than once, she catches herself wondering whether Nadine is maybe even a little bit  _ happy _ that Tammy has been away at school, opening up Abby’s time for her to sweep in and play hero.

Maybe the witch thing is just the cherry on top. Bringing a wand and an owl and a broomstick into the house only furthers the divide between Tammy and the people she now shares a house with. The girls, Mara and Miriam, two and three years younger, respectively, barely look at her; Michael is more polite but still keeps his distance. All of them tiptoe around Tammy like she’s dangerous.

No, she definitely does  _ not _ have the time to let her thoughts stray in Debbie Ocean’s direction. She’s got quite enough going on. Her thoughts don’t listen, though. They stray, anyway.

— • —

King’s Cross is bustling with activity, the way it always does on the first morning of September. Through the brick wall separating platforms nine and ten, and Tammy feels, quite suddenly, as if she is a puzzle piece clicking down into the spot where she belongs. The sensation is unfamiliar after the past few weeks spent in a house full of people who don’t know how to look directly at her.

It’s not until she has wound her way down the entire platform, her mum steadfastly at her side, that she finds her friends. Amita first, who dives headlong into a conversation with Tammy’s mother that is sure to carry on until they board the train, and then Rose, looking a little flustered as always. She can’t see Daphne anywhere, but her girlfriend is decidedly unhelpful when Tammy asks, only fluttering a hand to gesture back the way she came and mumbling something about drama.

So she can’t see Daphne, but she can see Debbie. She looks exactly the same and wildly different all at once. She stands with her spine straight, shoulders held back, eyes glinting dark. Looks older, somehow, like she’s simply seen too much. It takes Tammy a moment to figure out what’s missing, what’s making the other girl seem impossibly off-balance: Lou. They’re usually glued together at the hip, but the tall blonde is nowhere in sight, and while Debbie isn’t entirely  _ alone, _ given the way her other friends are crowded in close to her, Lou’s absence seems significant.

“Be good, okay?” Tammy’s mother tugs her into a hug, and she nods her promise to the request, pretending like she’s not already planning on sneaking out of her dormitory tonight. Her mum catches the worry in her eyes and frames Tammy’s face in her palms like she’s a child. “Don’t worry about me too much, okay? I’m going to be just fine. Write to me soon, honey, will you?”

It’s not until Tammy is on her patrol up and down the train, twenty minutes after the Hogwarts Express has pulled out of the station, that she manages to track Daphne down. The other girl chews her signature bubblegum over a magazine, idly flipping through the pages. About to slide the compartment door open to find out why, exactly, Daphne isn’t with Rose, waiting for her and Amita to finish their respective patrols, Tammy gets her answer before her fingers can reach the handle. In the opposite seat, Lou lounges in that easy way she always seems to, arms crossed pointedly over her chest, looking determinedly in any direction besides Daphne’s. Next to her, John Frazier waits, watches them, Head Boy badge pinned proudly to his robes. He makes eye contact with Tammy through the glass and shakes his head imperceptibly.

Daphne and Lou stay there until the train stops that afternoon. “What happened?” asks Tammy, wide-eyed, when they emerge from the Hogwarts Express, one after the other, and stride in opposite directions without a word to each other.

Tossing her hair, Daphne leads the way towards the carriages waiting to take them up to the castle. “I made captain,” she announces, her badge catching the light. She has pinned it in precisely the same place where Tammy’s prefect badge sits, on display for the whole world to see. “Miller’s jealous, and John wanted us to  _ apologize _ to each other.” The way she says it, it’s incredibly obvious that they did no such thing. She and Lou are both far too stubborn for that.

As their carriage jolts into movement, Tammy deflates a little. Just slightly. Because maybe, over the summer, she sort of entertained the idea that she  _ might _ be able to do something like talk to Debbie outside of their shared space in the dead of night. She thinks maybe they could be friends, out in the open. But if this is how the school year begins, that seems like a far-off, unrealistic dream.

Given that this is the first day back, they split up when they reach the Great Hall, sliding into seats at their own house tables. There is a stranger up at the staff table in Professor Ocean’s seat, and the sight of this newcomer makes something turn hollow in Tammy’s stomach. It brings a sudden gravity to the information she already knew from Debbie’s letter. A knot of fourth-years lean their heads together across the table to whisper about it, and she is too close to them not to hear Debbie’s mother’s name mentioned. She feels like she knows a heavy secret that nobody else is privy to, though Nine-Ball sits a few feet to her right and if anyone knows, it’s probably her. Tammy wishes she had friends in her own house, anyone to distract her from sinking deeper into this train of thought. The other girls in her year are nice enough, but she thinks they’re more like friendly acquaintances than actual friends. 

The first years shuffle in with their usual trepidation, wide-eyed, crowded together as if the physical closeness to their classmates is reassuring. Tammy makes an effort to smile at the ones she can make eye contact with. The benefit of not having friends to sit with is that she can keep the seats on either side of her open, making space for a few of the newest Ravenclaws. She winds up with a boy on her right, Dax, and a girl on her left, Jordan. Dax is Muggleborn, and clearly reassured when Tammy tells him they have that in common. She directs their gazes up to Professor McGonagall for the pre-dinner welcome speech, a hush sweeping across the room. The headmistress is undoubtedly good at commanding attention from the entire student body.

The usual spiel gives way into the more specific news quickly enough. “Unfortunately, we lost Professor Ocean over the summer,” she says, no tiptoeing around it, and Tammy immediately searches Debbie out. She almost expects to find the other girl with her head bowed down, dark hair obscuring her face from view – but after the glimpse of her she caught at King’s Cross, what she sees makes more sense. Debbie pointedly holds her chin up, gaze fixed unblinkingly on Professor McGonagall, a statuesque image of someone entirely unaffected by the mention of her mother.

But is she holding her breath?

A little guiltily, she realizes she’s been focused so intently on trying to see how Debbie is doing that she’s missed half of Professor McGonagall’s little speech. “Please welcome our new transfiguration teacher, Professor Chang,” she is announcing when Tammy drags her eyes back to the staff table, and the newcomer rises from her seat. “Professor Chang is an alumni of Ravenclaw House, and I am pleased to welcome her back to Hogwarts.” And then she moves right along, leaving the topic behind. Tammy eyes the new teacher for a moment. She’s pretty, with sleek dark hair and bright eyes, and falls deep into conversation with Professor Longbottom immediately as the Great Hall descends into mealtime.

She finds her gaze drawn back to the Gryffindor table a few more times. Debbie doesn’t seem to be looking back, but that’s not why she looks. All she can think about is how  _ she _ felt, coming back to school again after her dad died. How lonely she was, and how numb everything went. She’s searching for cues in the way Debbie holds herself, anything to piece together how the other girl is handling things. The lack of a letter back seemed like a telltale sign that it’s not particularly well, but she looks relatively okay, from afar.

Maybe she’s simply better at moving forward than Tammy ever was. Or maybe she’s just good at pretending.

She leads the new first-years up to Ravenclaw Tower, settles them into their new dormitories. Tells them about curfew and then feels, maybe rightfully, like the worst prefect ever when she steps back out into the corridor later.

The astronomy tower, midnight.

It’s not an official plan by any means – she considered writing it into the end of her letter but left it out in the end, unsure whether they’ve reached a point where they can mention that place, or the conversations they have there, offhand. But it’s a possibility, nonetheless. She imagines that if there’s going to be a particular night on which Debbie is unable to sleep, this first night back in the castle without her mother here would probably be it.

Maybe she pins a few too many hopes on that, though. Because when Debbie doesn’t show, there is this crushing disappointment she didn’t quite expect to feel.

It’s not a big deal, she tells herself after she’s given up and descended the spiral staircase to the base of the astronomy tower. The path back to her dormitory is deserted, her footfalls bouncing off the stone walls and coming back a little louder. She climbs into her bed and stares at the ceiling in the dark. There was no real agreement to go to the tower tonight; every other time they have sat side by side there, it’s been pure coincidence. Debbie isn’t  _ obligated _ to go there just so that Tammy can help her work through her loss. This isn’t about Tammy at all – it’s about Debbie, and her mum. That’s it.

Tammy blinks and sets her mouth into a thin, straight line. She is  _ not _ going to cry over Debbie Ocean.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> sometimes, things feel almost normal again. almost, but not quite. because her mother isn't here, and a million other things. like how danny isn't around to ruffle her hair when he passes her in the corridors. like how her friends are doing their best, but she feels like she's simply going through the motions, and that's not fair to any of them. and she keeps seeing tammy – the girl is in almost every one of her classes and, besides that, has a knack for popping up everywhere debbie is, so much that she genuinely can't tell whether it's purposeful or not – and she has no idea how to talk to her anymore.
> 
> everything feels hollow, still. maybe it will feel like that forever.
> 
> sleeping is more difficult than ever. debbie navigates the castle during the day like a ghost, pretending nobody can see the circles darkening underneath her eyes.
> 
> on sunday night, she goes to the astronomy tower.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so the last couple chapters have been kind of rough for these two idiots, and i swear, they actually speak to each other in this one. i promise. back to our regularly scheduled programming.

Her friends keep up a constant stream of chatter on the way to their first class after lunch, like they know she needs the distraction. Which she does.

Transfiguration.

The new teacher has left the classroom largely untouched, something that Debbie isn’t quite sure how she feels about. It’s nice, in a way, that there are still some hints of her mother in the castle – like the cup of chalk on the ledge under the blackboard, and the shelves full of books across the back of the room. On the other hand, this gives the classroom the undeniable air of a space occupied by entirely the wrong person. Professor Chang is not Debbie’s mother, and the little touches left behind are both welcomed and cheapened by her presence. There are small adjustments made that, otherwise, would have undoubtedly never been made, too – the teacher’s desk is on the other side of the board, and there is a portrait of Caroline Ocean on one wall.

Debbie averts her gaze and takes her usual seat between Lou and Nine-Ball in the back row.

“Good afternoon,” says Professor Chang as she moves into the room. She doesn’t sweep in and take command of the room immediately the way Debbie’s mother always did. There is too much of a bounce in her step to be particularly intimidating. She introduces herself, tells them that she was a Ravenclaw when she was at Hogwarts, drops the year she graduated. Fields a couple of questions about Harry Potter and the war when people figure out how the timeline matches up, and then dives forward into attendance. Debbie barely focuses, attention drawn back only when she hears, distantly, her name. “Deborah Ocean?”

Unmoving, unblinking, she corrects the woman automatically. “Debbie.”

She can feel Professor Chang’s pity when the teacher’s eyes find her, and she doesn’t want it. There is a worry taking hold in her head that if Chang is the type of teacher to hang a portrait of a deceased predecessor in her classroom, maybe she’s also the type to say something here, now, in front of everyone. But she has at least a little sense, and only nods. “Debbie,” she repeats. And that is the end of it, at least until the end of the lesson. 

She’s up out of her chair in a flash, but has barely made it halfway to the door when her near-freedom is snatched away. “Miss Ocean, can I speak with you for a moment?” Approaching the desk that used to belong to her mother, Debbie shoves her hands deep into the pockets of her robes and raises one eyebrow smoothly in questioning. “I just wanted to check in, see how you’re doing.”

Jaw tightening, Debbie resists the urge to bristle  _ visibly.  _ A complete stranger, sitting in her mother’s chair and asking her if she’s  _ okay? _ Is that supposed to be reassuring? Is it supposed to make the last few months feel anything but wrong? She glances swiftly toward the door; Lou and Nine-Ball wait for her there, pretending not to listen. And beyond them, Tammy. Tammy, who she never wrote back to, a slight frown tugging at her lips and her eyebrows like she’s worried, too. 

Looking back to Professor Chang, Debbie nods decisively. “I’m fine,” she says, maybe a little too loudly.

The next day, she skips transfiguration altogether, tells her friends she’s not feeling well at lunch and goes back to the common room with Constance instead. This subject was never Constance’s strong suit – she’s a charms girl, through and through, and scraped by her transfiguration OWL without a high enough mark to make it to the higher level courses. Debbie curls up in a chair by the fireplace with a blanket and one of her mum’s books and bails on her other classes, too, doesn’t emerge until dinnertime. She determinedly does not look at the staff table for the entire meal, but Constance stage-whispers that Professor Chang is looking at her. Debbie pretends not to care.

The one class she goes to consistently all week is, surprisingly, herbology. She doesn’t think she would be sticking with the subject at all, if not for the teacher. Herbology itself is sort of lame, but against all odds, Professor Longbottom is undoubtedly her favourite remaining member of the faculty. There are two types of confidence, the kind that has been learned painstakingly over time and the kind that has been instilled in someone’s veins since the very beginning, and they present themselves differently. He has the learned kind, Debbie can tell. That gained her respect from day one. Her father has always been firmly of the opinion that herbology is essentially useless, but Debbie likes it. There is something calming about the greenhouses, being surrounded by flowers and leaves and the earthy smell of it all. And maybe there’s that added bonus of it being something her father doesn’t think is worth giving time to. Small rebellions only, for Debbie.

Professor Longbottom lets her hang around the greenhouses when she’s supposed to be in other places. Maybe he figures that, at the very least, it means someone knows exactly where she is. He mentions something offhandedly about how he didn’t have a good relationship with his old potions professor, but doesn’t elaborate. She wonders what he knows about Professor Chang – they were in school at the same time, after all – and whether he tells her that Debbie sometimes sits in one of his greenhouses when she’s supposed to be in the transfiguration classroom. She doesn’t ask, though. Perhaps she doesn’t really want to know. He gives her little tasks here and there (“If you’re going to stay in Four while I’m in Two with the third-years, you might as well…”) and she carries them out carefully, focusing all her attention on the jobs so that there’s no space left to think about anything else.

It seems that her friends have taken it upon themselves to ensure that Debbie is never left entirely on her own. They know her well enough by this point to know not to try to pressure her into talking. If there’s one thing she hates, it’s being worried about, treated like she is fragile in some way. She isn’t blind enough to think that they  _ aren’t  _ worrying about her, but she appreciates each of them to the ends of the earth for not making it come across so obviously. Lou makes a conscious effort to check in with her periodically without actually forcing an in-depth discussion. Constance is always good for a distraction at a moment’s notice, and Nine-Ball wordlessly lends Debbie all her transfiguration notes while she skips three classes in a row.

She feels  _ lonely, _ though, despite their near-constant presence. It’s not that she can’t talk to them – because she can, and she  _ does, _ and sometimes things feel almost normal again.

Almost, but not quite. Because her mother isn’t here, and a million other things. Like how Danny isn’t around to ruffle her hair when he passes her in the corridors, and she can’t seem to figure out why she misses that, or how to write anything of real substance down on parchment to send to him. Like how her friends are doing their best, but she feels like she’s simply going through the motions, and that’s not fair to any of them. Like how the coursework for sixth year is more difficult and more interesting, and yet she can’t bring herself to focus properly on it. And she keeps seeing Tammy – the girl is in almost every one of her classes and, besides that, has a knack for popping up everywhere Debbie is, so much that she genuinely can’t tell whether it’s purposeful or not – and she has no idea how to talk to her anymore.

Everything feels hollow, still. Maybe it will feel like that forever.

Sleeping is more difficult than ever. Debbie navigates the castle during the day like a ghost, pretending nobody can see the circles darkening underneath her eyes.

On Sunday night, she goes to the astronomy tower. It’s been a while – all summer and one week, but her feet carry her there without requiring her to think about it. Tammy is already there when she reaches the top. She isn’t sitting with her feet dangling through the railing to look at the sky, but instead sits cross-legged closer to the stairs, eyes meeting hers immediately, fingers twisting together in her lap. “Hi,” says Debbie, faltering momentarily there in the doorway.

Tammy smiles softly. She hasn’t been smiling at Debbie in daylight, just glancing her way more often than she needs to, like she wants to reassure herself that Debbie is still there. “Have you been sleeping okay?” she asks, skipping over a greeting entirely. The only answer she receives is a shrug, and they both know what it means. “I just haven’t seen you up here lately.”

Stepping out into the open, Debbie shrugs again. Belatedly, she realizes she’s wearing the same sweater that Tammy’s address found its way into the pocket of. “Maybe I was afraid I’d end up coming on a night you were here,” she admits, surprising herself with how easily it comes out. The other girl doesn’t flinch away from the honesty of it, and Debbie doesn’t mean for it to sound hostile. She’s been hesitant to put herself in any space where she and Tammy might be alone, after the sheer panic of the summer. This is a place for truths.

Blinking, Tammy waits to answer until Debbie has sat down next to her, as if to make sure that it’s too late for her to turn tail and go back to the Gryffindor common room. “I’ve been here every night since we got back.” 

The question is automatic. “Why?”

A little cryptically, Tammy replies, “Maybe I was afraid you’d end up being here alone.”

After that, it feels like maybe things are starting to go back to normal. Debbie isn’t quite sure when, or how, her  _ normal _ included sitting with Tammy Prescott at the top of the astronomy tower in the middle of the night, but there’s no denying that the strange unsteady feeling dissipates a little in this space. 

Still, it takes a little time to get back into that routine of talking that they built up at the end of fifth year. Once, Tammy told her that something permanent had shifted in her after her dad’s death, and Debbie thought she understood, then, but there is a difference between comprehending the idea and going through those changes herself. There are a hundred things to grow accustomed to now – her mother’s absence, Danny’s less lasting but still difficult disappearance from her daily life, the small diamond hanging from a chain around Debbie’s neck that feels more familiar to her each day.

“It was my mum’s,” she says when Tammy’s gaze lingers on it, and it turns out those four words are enough to open up the floodgates, and then, very suddenly, she can’t  _ stop _ talking. She tells Tammy about the hospital and how her mother smiled when her friends came to visit, even though it wasn’t a room for smiling in. About how Danny and Tess arrived when it was already too late, how empty everything felt after that moment, how her father started packing up her mother’s things far sooner than she would have if it were up to just her. She tells Tammy about the books she’s read, stashed away in her room and slipped as many as she could into her trunk when she packed it at the end of the summer. And the funeral and all the black and all the sorrys and how she didn’t say a word out loud for a week, and how when she did again, her voice cracked. 

There are too many things to say, and after all the words are out, she feels like there is still  _ more. _ But Tammy is good at this – being  _ there _ for people – and helps her start to work through all of it, one piece at a time, with all the patience in the world. She listens the next night when Debbie clumsily attempts to explain why she didn’t write back, and she still listens the night after that when she struggles to put words to that fuzzy moment just in between sleeping and waking, where she feels  _ okay _ until the realization that her mother is gone slams down all over again.

She still can’t put her finger on it – on just what about Tammy causes her to open herself up  _ this _ much. 

— • —

Grudgingly, Debbie begins to attend her classes more regularly again. She still skips transfiguration some days, the days that being in that room feels too overwhelming to push through. Professor Chang smiles at her when she trails in behind Nine-Ball midway through the second week of term, the small kind of smile that means she’s trying not to make a big deal out of it. 

“It’s good to have you back, Debbie,” she says, as if Debbie’s been sick for an extended period of time, or maybe on vacation. Maybe it’s intended to be reassuring in some way, but it only makes Debbie’s frown deepen as she finds her seat.

Slowly, over the course of that first month, she pulls herself together. Bit by bit, with Tammy’s help, whether the girl knows it or not. Being able to talk to her at night means there is less for Debbie to bottle up and carry around with her during the day. She laughs out loud at lunch one day, and it feels  _ nice _ instead of wrong.

Transfiguration, though, does not go quite so smoothly. 

She is  _ there, _ but only officially. Doesn’t make a move to read the chapters she is supposed to read. Turns in a half-completed assignment even though Nine-Ball offers to help her finish it. Arrives late to every other lesson and asks to go to the bathroom twenty minutes in most days, wanders the corridors instead until someone catches her and asks why she’s not in class.

She can feel the new professor’s disappointment radiating in her direction whenever she’s in sight, and maybe even takes a little pride in it, a little satisfaction.

On the first Friday of October, Professor Chang catches her on her way out of the classroom. Debbie has successfully avoided a one-on-one conversation with her since that first day of class, and crosses her arms defensively in preparation for this one. Her friends linger automatically at the door, but the teacher crosses over to shut it with a definitive  _ click. _

“I wanted to speak with you,” she says, without any preamble, “about your performance in class.” She doesn’t sit down, but stands instead, shuffling through a pile of parchment until she finds one she’s apparently looking for. “I’m not going to lie to you, Debbie. It’s very early on to be this clear, but at this rate, you’re going to fail the year. I know NEWT-level transfiguration is significantly more complicated than what you’ve learned so far. Is the material just too… difficult? Confusing?”

“Yes,” Debbie lies. She doesn’t know, is the real answer. Hasn’t even been paying enough attention to determine whether or not she  _ could _ learn this, if she tried.

Bewilderingly, the response to that is a  _ smile. _ It’s small and a little sad, but it’s definitely a smile. “See, I’m not entirely convinced that it is,” muses Professor Chang. And oh, Debbie doesn’t know where this is going, but she doesn’t think she likes it. She watches the teacher trail one fingertip down the piece of parchment she holds. “It says here you got an O on your OWL last June, and the rest of the staff seem to feel that this is your best subject. Maybe even your favourite one, too. It seems to me that it’s a little unlikely that someone’s understanding of a whole branch of magic could decline so far in such a short time.”

Guarded, uncertain, Debbie frowns, asks bluntly, “So what are you saying?”

“I’m saying, maybe you just need a little help,” says Professor Chang, and Debbie can already feel every part of herself defying that statement. The woman raises a hand before she can cut in. “Give me thirty seconds before you shoot me down, all right?” It’s not a question, or at least not one that requires an answer. She makes a show of glancing at the clock before she nods, anyway. Regrets the sarcastic nature of that a little when the next words out of Professor Chang’s mouth are, “When I was in my fifth year here, my boyfriend died.”

There’s a little silence here; Debbie has no idea what to say. She thinks Tammy would probably know what to say, what to do. Tammy is a thousand times better at this than she is.

“Afterward, it was… very hard for me to move forward.” Debbie tries to listen the way Tammy would listen to her, if this was the astronomy tower and a handful of hours later. Her teacher describes things that Debbie has become familiar with. The loss of appetite, the lack of peaceful sleep, the inability to focus on much of anything at all. “Transfiguration was his favourite subject – which, of course, made it an incredibly difficult one, for me. Funny, isn’t it, considering where I am now?” It’s not funny, though, not the laughable kind. There is another loaded pause. It has been more than thirty seconds, and the mood has shifted so far that Debbie can’t bring herself to point it out. Professor Chang shrugs minutely. “I know it’s not the same as what you’re going through. But once I got a little help, I got to find the joy in this class again.”

“Help from you?”

“Merlin, no. I’d hate to subject you to more time with me when you already don’t want to come to class.” She’s smiling again. Debbie’s pretty sure she’ll never understand this woman’s range of emotion. “I’d like you to pay attention, though, when you’re here. That’s only going to help you.” A big, careful breath, like she’s working up to something big, and then: “I’m thinking more along the lines of a tutor.”

Debbie shakes her head automatically, but Professor Chang is looking at her so  _ hopefully,  _ and she’s just spilled her whole story about her fifth-year boyfriend and all of the uncanny parallels between how she handled that and how Debbie is handling  _ this. _ Sharing that information was a tactic, and it’s  _ working. _ She knows because she finds herself sighing and answering, “I’ll try it. No promises. And if I hate it, I get to stop.” Professor Chang nods, and it’s Debbie’s turn to hold up a hand. “On one condition.”

The differences between Professor Chang and Debbie’s mother are particularly evident anytime she so much as thinks about the woman, but this is a big one: She tilts her head just slightly to one side, curiosity piquing, and asks, “What sort of condition do you have in mind?” This is exactly the sort of question that Debbie’s mother would never have asked.

Hesitantly, Debbie adjusts her book bag’s strap over her shoulder. “Can you take the picture down?” She doesn’t look at it, hanging in the space it has been given on the other side of the classroom, but there is no mistaking which one she means.

A flicker of surprise crosses Professor Chang’s face before it settles into a soft sort of understanding. “Yes, of course. I only meant to honour her in some way.” She sets the parchment full of OWL grades down and reaches out a hand to shake. “You’ve got yourself a deal. Be here tomorrow night, eight o’clock.”

On her way out of the classroom, Debbie stops, her hand already on the doorknob, and turns back, just for a moment. “She used to have a painting of a lavender field there. She said it was calming, cleared away everything else so we could focus.”

— • —

“Tutoring?” Constance wrinkles her nose distastefully at dinner the next night. “Dude, that  _ sucks.  _ Maybe you could just bail.”

This seems to be the general consensus from all of her friends, and Debbie is automatically inclined to share their opinion. But she’s got an agreement with Professor Chang now, has even gone so far as sealing it with that handshake. So she will, reluctantly, give it a handful of sessions – just enough to have made a visible effort and prove, to both herself and the transfiguration teacher, that this strategy doesn’t work. And then she’ll call the whole thing off.

At eight o’clock, she taps her knuckles on the open door of the classroom to announce her presence, and Professor Chang smiles broadly, like she really  _ is _ glad to see Debbie here at all. It takes about half a second for Debbie to zero in on the tutor she’s found.

Tammy.

Of  _ course _ it’s Tammy. Without a doubt, the smartest person in the class besides maybe Nine-Ball, and no teacher is going to give her one of her best friends as a tutor. And besides that, Tammy is well-suited for this. Teaching. Most of what she knows about the girl lines up perfectly with tutoring troubled kids in her spare time: Ravenclaw, a prefect, soft and approachable and not at all the type to make things difficult. Just the type of person who is capable of melding herself carefully around someone else’s learning needs. Really, she shouldn’t be surprised that this is the choice Professor Chang has made.

For a moment, she’s frozen in a strange sort of fight-or-flight stance. This is absolutely  _ not  _ the safe place where she has grown accustomed to spending time around the other girl, and she has no idea at all how she’s supposed to talk to her in this setting. The idea of turning on her heel to leave seems rather appealing, like it would stop her heart from beating entirely too quickly and irregularly, but Professor Chang has already stepped in her direction to usher her further into the room.

“Debbie, glad you could make it!” She glances from Debbie to Tammy and back again, dark eyes flickering with an understanding that turns out to be completely off-base. “So I know you two don’t exactly run in the same social circles, but – well, Tammy has the highest marks in the class, and I think this will be a good match. Let’s just… leave anything else at the door, all right?”

Tammy offers her a small, hesitant smile, and Debbie’s fears lose a little of their hold on her at the sight of it. “Yeah, all right,” she answers carefully.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "up here feels so... different. from everything else. i like it." debbie waits a moment, like she needs to give that time to sink in. it settles deep in tammy's bones and brings that light, airy feeling with it again. "maybe i just don't want to ruin... this."
> 
> she softens. of course she does. sometimes, she has learned, debbie says things that just do that to her. like saying, perhaps a little indirectly, that this connection they have forged is something that could, in fact, be ruined. that it's something that debbie doesn't want to be ruined. that it’s something she cares enough about to try to protect.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> good news, guys... i think i've actually finished writing this entire fic! which has been a wild ride, lemme tell you. i'm going to try and keep posting each chapter on some kind of semi-regular schedule, but i may attempt to post a little more frequently? we'll see how that goes. anyway, here we go!

The transfiguration classroom becomes another place where they grow  _ comfortable _ around each other.

Debbie seems more at ease here than she has since the first lesson of the year, and Tammy thinks this is, in large part, due to the disappearance of Professor Ocean’s painted face on the wall. The portrait has been replaced by a familiar, and recently pulled out of storage, painting of a field filled with lavender. Learning how to turn this into another one of their safe spaces is slow-going – Professor Chang is forever moving in and out of the room, and there’s always a chance that another student might appear out of nowhere for a one-on-one conversation with her, and there is a curriculum to focus on. Which, truthfully, Debbie picks up incredibly quickly. Not that Tammy had any doubts about the brunette’s intelligence. Debbie Ocean is  _ smart, _ and it’s clear enough from the very beginning of this tutoring situation that the reason her grades have slipped so far has nothing to do with the difficulty of the material. No, it is all the other things, everything she has said into cold night air up at the top of the astronomy tower. The missing space where her mother used to be, the new person at the front of her classroom.

She is stubborn, though. Tammy knew this, too, but there is a world of difference between understanding it and dealing with it firsthand. It seems that Debbie is determined not to improve  _ too quickly, _ and at least once a session, Tammy finds herself crossing her arms with a deep frown and saying something like, “Come on, Debbie, I  _ know _ you know this.”

In secret, at their spot where there is nobody else to listen to them, Debbie tells her that she was planning on stopping after three tutoring sessions,  _ maybe _ four. Determinedly telling Professor Chang that it wasn’t working for her, and refusing to go back again. But October quietly carries forward, jack o’lanterns popping up as the castle readies itself for Halloween. And by the time the first Hogsmeade trip of the year rolls around, they’ve spent a grand total of nine hours in that classroom, on nine separate nights, and Debbie shows no signs of cutting that off. It makes Tammy feel lighter, in some way she can’t quite explain. To have another space where she can sit across from the Gryffindor girl, to have a teacher-approved reason on her lips if anyone asks.

“I can’t believe Chang is still making you tutor her,” Daphne says as they queue up to leave the castle for the village down the lane. It’s not the first time she’s said it, and while she’s definitely the most  _ vocal _ of Tammy’s friends, Rose and Amita nod along wide-eyed, anyway. “What’s it been now, a month? Maybe she’s just, like, a lost cause.”

Turned backward in line to face her friends, Tammy can see Debbie, twenty people back. She cuts in smoothly next to Lou and Nine-Ball with Constance, turns her back pointedly against the open-mouthed glares of the Slytherin fifth-years behind them. For a moment – just one rare, standstill moment – her eyes meet Tammy’s, and it feels like everything else stops. She smiles, just barely, only the corners of her mouth turning up slightly, and Tammy smiles back, and then the eye contact is lost and the moment is gone. 

“She’s not that bad,” answers Tammy, doing her very best not to sound defensive enough for the others to pick up on. That means questions, and she isn’t quite ready to share the astronomy tower with anyone else.

It feels sort of  _ nice,  _ to know a side of Debbie Ocean that nobody else knows. The side that wants to look at the stars when she can’t sleep, that has a hundred secrets held in dark eyes, that lets herself be just a little more vulnerable around Tammy than she might be otherwise. There is something miraculous about being trusted with someone else’s inner thoughts. It makes Tammy feel incredibly  _ important _ in a way she isn’t sure she has ever felt before.

At the Three Broomsticks, she runs into Debbie – quite literally – in the bathroom. She is stepping out and Debbie is coming in; they collide briefly, and as Tammy takes a hurried step backwards again, Amita walks into  _ her.  _ Smiling sheepishly, Tammy’s hands move behind her to steady her friend. “Hey,” she greets Debbie through a tiny laugh.

Debbie doesn’t say a word. Her eyes flicker over Tammy’s face, and then she sidesteps around her to disappear into the bathroom, and that’s all.

It’s as if someone has poked a hole into her and all the air is slowly seeping out.

Amita links arms with her to tug her back into motion, and when they reach their table and slide into their seats across from Daphne and Rose, she doesn’t mention anything about the bathroom doorway incident at all. Distantly, Tammy feels grateful for that.

They cross paths with Debbie and her friends twice more before making their way back up the winding road to Hogwarts. Each time, Tammy tries to meet the other girl’s eyes, and Debbie carefully doesn’t look at her at all. She does this with the graceful, casual art of someone who doesn’t realize Tammy is nearby at all, only it looks just a little too purposeful to be a coincidence. Good mood sliding away, she trails a few steps behind her friends back to the castle.

So much for feeling important. 

Maybe she won’t go to the tower tonight.

Instead, she sits in the common room to write a letter to her mum, and goes to bed early. This works just fine until she wakes up just before one o’clock in the morning and all she can picture is Debbie sitting there on her own. Willing herself to stay put, Tammy imagines small weights pinning her to the mattress of her four-poster bed. Debbie probably isn’t there tonight, either. She spent the entire afternoon pretending Tammy doesn’t exist, after all.

Once the image of Debbie at the top of the tower alone is in her head, though, she can’t get rid of it.

Sleepily, she makes her way to the base of the astronomy tower, doesn’t even bother putting a robe over her pyjamas. If she runs into another prefect or a professor on patrol, she’ll probably get points docked, at the very least. The door is an inch or two ajar, and she climbs the stairs to the top until Debbie comes into view. Because of  _ course _ she’s there. And of  _ course _ she turns to smile softly over her shoulder at the sound of Tammy’s feet shuffling in her direction. This place is different from all others. It’s the place where the rest of the world simply drops away beneath them.

“Chocolate Frog?” Debbie pulls one from her pocket like a peace offering. Three wrappers and trading cards lie in between them when Tammy sits down.

She shakes her head, but takes it anyway. “Why don’t you acknowledge me anywhere but here?”

The question is quiet, and for a few drawn-out seconds, she thinks maybe Debbie didn’t hear her ask it at all. She’s only thinking, though. Not looking at Tammy directly, but not in the purposeful way that she did earlier – just in the way Tammy has grown accustomed to. She watches Debbie from one side, imagining that she can see the girl’s mind working.

“I don’t know,” says Debbie finally, and a disappointment swells in Tammy’s chest. But as she takes a slow, deep breath to steady herself against it, the other girl twists her mouth to one side in thought and adds, “I guess I don’t really know how to. Up here feels so… different. From everything else. I like it.” She waits for a moment, like she needs to give that time to sink in. It settles deep in Tammy’s bones and brings that light, airy feeling with it again.  _ I like it.  _ “I mean, it’s obviously not a secret that my friends and yours don’t exactly get along. Maybe I just don’t want that to ruin… this.”

She softens. Of course she does. Sometimes, she has learned, Debbie says things that just do that to her. Like saying, perhaps a little indirectly, that this connection they have forged is something that could, in fact, be ruined. That it’s something that Debbie doesn’t  _ want _ to be ruined. That it’s something she cares enough about to try to protect.

— • —

Every single one of her days is all filled up – school and Quidditch practice and tutoring Debbie and tutoring a couple other kids in charms, too, and prefect duties and homework, endless amounts of homework, more homework than ever before.

Nighttime, typically, does not bring sleep. Tammy still finds it as difficult to sleep as she did before, only now the darkness comes hand-in-hand with something to look forward to. She  _ likes _ climbing the stairs to their special hidden-away perch on top of the world. Likes sitting next to Debbie, close enough now that sometimes their shoulders touch and she pretends not to really notice. Likes talking, or not talking, because some nights, just being quiet there, together, is comforting enough. She even sort of likes the satisfied fatigue that settles down upon her in the morning, when her body realizes she has pushed it a little too far on not quite enough sleep yet again.

It’s not every night. Sometimes it’s just her, and she thinks some nights are just Debbie. The solitude is familiar, and still carries that same healing quality that it always has. But in their own way, the times they both go are simply better. Tammy doesn’t mind admitting this, just to herself.

The first Quidditch game of the season is Ravenclaw versus Gryffindor. Tammy makes an impressive save against a shot of Lily Potter’s, catches a glimpse of Debbie fighting back a smile in the stands. Manages not to drop the Quaffle entirely at the sight, which she considers to be rather spectacular in and of itself. Debbie is not particularly invested in Quidditch, never has been – she attends matches because everyone else does and it is expected, and pays attention only to Constance and Lou, respectively, when they are playing. Tammy feels honoured to be added to that shortlist. She is exhilarated, still, when she goes to the tower that night.

Her mother gets a new job and less free time, and her letters grow shorter. They are further apart, too, and she can’t help but wonder if it is because of Nadine. Her mother’s friend can’t possibly enjoy Storm appearing at her window on a regular basis, not after her attitude towards Tammy all summer long. Tammy tells Debbie this, too, recounting every piece of information from her mum’s letters out loud to remind herself that it is real. They talk about her dad, about Debbie’s mother, about things they’ve talked about before and things they’ve never touched on. Nothing is off limits. When she was little, Tammy used to keep a diary, write all her secrets in it and hide them away underneath the corner of her mattress. Debbie is like that. A diary, only she’s living and breathing. She will keep all of Tammy’s secrets safe, and Tammy will keep hers.

There are a thousand things to think about, to stress about, and Tammy is overwhelmed, most of the time. The astronomy tower, though, calms her. She feels small there, in the best way possible. Being closer to the stars reminds her that there is a whole universe around her, farther than she could ever really imagine, and that she is only one tiny piece of it. It grounds her, oddly. And that feeling attaches itself to Debbie, too, so that she can feel it in other places, too. Like the transfiguration classroom when nobody else is in there. Tammy has never associated this feeling with a  _ person _ before, didn’t know it could work like that at all. It is equal parts beautiful and terrifying.

She wants to hold onto it.

— • —

“What’s going on with you?” Daphne frowns across the Hufflepuff table at breakfast, serious enough to release Rose’s hand to focus. Tammy, covering  _ another _ yawn behind her hand, only shrugs. “Do you drink coffee? You should probably start. Here.” She fills a mug and holds it out with an expression that can only mean this is not a choice. “If you  _ absolutely insist _ on staying up all night to study, it’s either coffee or drop a couple classes.”

Perhaps a little reluctantly, Tammy accepts the mug. She has never been a coffee drinker, but she is sixteen years old and regularly functioning on four hours of sleep. Maybe Daphne is right. She takes a careful sip and it’s too hot, too bitter. “How do you drink this every day?”

“You need milk,” decides Rose, nearly knocking over the orange juice as she reaches for it. “And sugar. Trust me.” She busies herself with Tammy’s mug, stirring far more sugar into it than could ever really be necessary. Tammy takes another apprehensive sip, and it’s better. Rose smiles, pleased, as she sits back again.

The mail arrives, and Storm carries a rather thin envelope along with the morning’s copy of the  _ Daily Prophet.  _ Her mother hasn’t written much, and hasn’t had the time to directly reply to hardly anything Tammy said in her last letter. She tells one hurried story about the school play Mara has a landed the lead in, and a minuscule anecdote about the job.  _ Write again soon. Love you,  _ she signs off at the end, and that’s all.

Disappointment rises in Tammy’s throat. There is a distance between them, one that feels far more real than the physical space stretched out between here and suburban London. 

She folds the letter up as she always does – in half, quarters, eighths – and then tucks it into the front of her potions textbook for safekeeping. She has no idea what to write back. What is she supposed to say, when she doesn’t care about Mara’s school play? Is she meant to write more about Hogwarts, about her classes and the Quidditch game and maybe a couple little snippets about Debbie, when her mum doesn’t even have enough time to write anything about them? It’s not as if she blames her mother for it, she reasons to herself. She is forever doing that, trying to justify each and every one of her feelings, whether they are worth permitting herself to feel or not. It’s difficult to keep in touch when she is so far away, and now there are other people to take up her time, to hear all her stories firsthand, so she doesn’t have to wait and get them all out on paper. She has a closer, more accessible audience in Nadine’s family, and she’s still settling in with the new job after several tumultuous months. Reason upon reason that this is not enough of a problem to raise concern.

And yet.

“It feels like I’m losing her somehow,” she confesses that night, feeling a deep-cutting twinge of guilt for complaining about this when Debbie’s mother is gone so much more permanently.

Debbie understands, though. She always seems to. She is much more perceptive than she is often given credit for. Leaning over to the side a little, she bumps Tammy’s shoulder with hers, like the touch might be somehow reassuring (and it is, though Tammy couldn’t possibly explain why). 

“You get to go back for Christmas, right? That’s only a month and a half away. Barely anything, in the grand scheme of things.” She nods when Tammy does, carrying forward determinedly, “Maybe it’s just that she’s with those other people, because you don’t like them much. Nadine and her family. It creates a bit of a… disconnect.” She says this confidently, the way that Tammy has learned she does when she’s either sure she’s right or trying to pretend she is. It’s difficult to spot the difference, but Debbie’s conviction is infectious. It has a way of burrowing into Tammy’s head and learning how to live there. “That’s kind of why I’m, like, counting down the days to Christmas break. I’m going to get to see Danny again.”

“Have you written to him much?” Tammy asks curiously.

Shaking her head, Debbie takes a moment before she speaks. A beat to think, to work past the automatic responses anyone else might get and figure out the true answer – at least, that’s what Tammy likes to think these gaps mean. That there is a reply for everyone else, and then a separate one reserved for only a select few hand-picked people who get to know  _ more. _

“Only a couple times,” she says, hesitant now. The confidence from before has evaporated slightly. “I just don’t really know how to talk to him about it. And it’s  _ weird, _ you know, not having him around here. I guess I’m hoping by Christmas enough… time will have passed. Maybe he’ll be ready to work through some stuff by then. Or not. I don’t know.”

She smiles out across the grounds, and it’s not the smile that she gives to everyone else. There is something muted about it, a little sad, like someone has left too much water on a paintbrush and the colour is faded when it appears on the page.

Maybe a little impulsively, Tammy reaches out and places her hand over Debbie’s in the space between her left leg and Debbie’s right. Like the shoulder touch before, something hopefully reassuring. The same, and entirely different. 

Neither of them move for a moment, Debbie looking straight ahead, Tammy watching their hands as if seeing them from afar. She didn’t think about doing this; it just happened, almost as if she didn’t realize she was moving until she made contact, when it was too late to stop herself. Her mind whirls, begins to spiral into regret. And then, silently, Debbie twists her hand so their palms touch, curls her fingers around Tammy’s. Their thumbs settle next to each other and then they are still again.

“It’ll be good to see him in person again,” says Tammy, trying to sound as confident as Debbie did before. Her voice feels like it catches briefly in her throat on the way up; she tries not to focus on it, hoping it’s not as noticeable as she thinks it is. “Like for my mum. It’ll be good.”

Debbie nods again. “If it’s not, you can write,” she says. A pause, in which she seems to realize what she’s said. Then, “Just to get the thoughts out. If you want, I mean.”

Tammy’s lips twitch in a smile. “Will you write back this time?”

This grants her a laugh, clear in the cool November air. She likes the sound of Debbie’s laugh, isn’t quite sure how she managed to spend five entire years not paying attention to it. “We’ll see.”

Debbie doesn’t let go, and Tammy wonders.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> she spends all of one saturday hanging around the greenhouses, and then the saturday after that. "what are you escaping from today?" asks professor longbottom, clicking his tongue when she appears on the second weekend. he doesn't expect an answer, but she gives him one, anyway.
> 
> "everything in my head."
> 
> he lets her stay straight through lunch, makes tea and doesn't even bother asking if she wants any, just hands her a teacup and sits on one of the wooden benches, looking at her expectantly until she sits, too. this is, she thinks, one of her favourite things about him – how he quietly understands, just like tammy but not like her at all, at the same time. how he never pries for information she doesn’t want to give. it feels rather like having somebody on her side.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you know what? i've spent the past three days thinking about posting this chapter, and it's finally time.

Something about Tammy Prescott keeps drawing her in, and she can’t figure out what it is. 

This is not because Debbie  cannot pick out the good things about her. On the contrary, the problem seems to be that there are  _ too many _ good things to determine which one is the root of the problem.

It could be anything from the way she always, without fail, listens to anything Debbie has to say, to the way the corners of her eyes crinkle when she laughs. Then there is the thoughtfulness – the way she remembers small details days later, the advice that is almost always just what Debbie needs to hear, the forget-me-nots dried in between the pages of the letter she sent back in the summer. Maybe it has to do with the fact that she hasn’t told anyone about all the hours they’ve spent at the top of the astronomy tower, just because Debbie asked her not to. Or that sometimes, she speaks so freely that Debbie is sure she is not this open with anybody else at all. Not to mention the downright distracting tactics she uses as a tutor, eyes lighting up with interest when she talks about how to perfect a bird-conjuring charm, leaning in intoxicatingly close to point things out in Debbie’s copy of the textbook.

Maybe it’s just all of those things, and they barely scratch the surface. Debbie doesn’t have the  _ time _ for this.

She spends all of one Saturday hanging around the greenhouses, and then the Saturday after that. “What are you escaping from today?” asks Professor Longbottom, clicking his tongue when she appears on the second weekend. He doesn’t expect an answer, but she gives him one, anyway.

“Everything in my head.”

He lets her stay straight through lunch, disappears for twenty minutes and reappears with sandwiches because she’s showed no signs at all of stopping for food. Makes tea and doesn’t even bother asking if she wants any, just hands her a teacup and sits on one of the wooden benches, looking at her expectantly until she sits, too. This is, she thinks, one of her favourite things about Professor Longbottom – how he quietly  _ understands, _ just like Tammy but not like her at all, at the same time. How he never pries for information she doesn’t want to give. It feels rather like having somebody on her side.

November slides forward and everything around the castle gears toward winter. Debbie breaks out the thickest and the softest of her sweaters for the astronomy tower. Tammy has a puffy black coat with faux fur lining the hood, that she takes to wearing unzipped over pyjamas. She pins her prefect badge to her shirt underneath, like that somehow makes it okay to break curfew. Even prefects crawl back into their beds around the time Debbie leaves the portrait of the fat lady in her wake; this is how Tammy gets to the tower sometimes, still in her school robes after her own patrol shifts.

Sleep is hard to come by when she spends half of most nights perched at the highest point of the castle. Her time falls into a blur: Classes and homework and tutoring and more homework and then those precious few hours when everything else falls away, when it’s just her and Tammy and no expectations. A little sleep, never enough, and then she’s waking up to start the whole process over again. She lives off of black coffee and weekend sleep-ins, unwilling to give up the best thing she has going for her in order to catch a little extra sleep. She thinks she would trade any of the other things in a heartbeat, but not the astronomy tower (not  _ Tammy, _ whispers the voice in the back of her mind, but she isn’t about to admit that, even to herself).

She is tired all the time, and she doesn’t care. This is the most alive she has felt in longer than she can remember, longer than just since the summer.

(“Do you ever feel like there’s only maybe one or two people in the world who understand you? Like, more than regular understanding?” she asks one night. She imagines tracing the pad of her thumb over the back of Tammy’s hand, sweeping it across her knuckles, and instead folds her hands together in her lap to keep them from doing so.)

(“Yes,” Tammy answers.)

Tammy is one of those people, she thinks. Tammy, and Lou. Maybe Danny, sometimes, but sometimes doesn’t count for quite enough, in this sense. Guiltily, she wonders if that means Lou doesn’t really count, either, because Debbie still can’t manage to tell her about all of this. Or any of it. She can’t figure out how to breathe a word of it out loud to anyone, isn’t sure she wants to push herself to do it.

She has never kept a real secret from Lou. The feeling is foreign, something vaguely uncomfortable that is easy enough to ignore until she starts thinking about it, and then quite impossible to think of anything  _ else. _

For a while, she tells herself that she isn’t lying. Not really. Omitting information isn’t exactly the same. This only lasts until mid-November, when they’re sitting at the Slytherin table, Debbie’s shoulder pressed right up against Lou’s because personal space isn’t something they are often aware of. “Where’d you go last night?” asks Constance, blunt as ever, popping a strawberry into her mouth as she eyes Debbie across the table. “I woke up to pee and you weren’t in your bed.”

Almost comically, her friends’ eyes all swivel to Debbie. She carefully finishes chewing her bite of muffin and swallows before she answers. “Sometimes I go downstairs when I can’t sleep.” Avoiding eye contact is a dead giveaway when someone is lying, and she knows it. Purposefully, she meets Constance’s eyes as she speaks. Doesn’t look at Lou, though. The blonde has a knack for picking up on things, no matter how hard Debbie tries. She has no idea what it is that Lou sees in her face that tips her off (“You know you’ve got a tell, right?” she asked once, and then shook her head smugly when Debbie tried to press her to find out what it was).

She’s pretty sure Constance doesn’t know this tell, but the girl eyes her suspiciously, anyway. “I checked the common room, Deb.”

Debbie rolls her eyes, holds her hands up like a gesture of surrender. “So I go for a walk sometimes,” she sighs, picking another piece off the top half of her muffin. “Sue me.” Nine-Ball is eying her curiously, and a paralyzing fear clenches in Debbie’s stomach for an awful moment. Does she know something? Does she wake up in the middle of the night to find that Tammy’s bed is empty, too? For a moment, she tries to search Nine-Ball’s face for these answers, as if there will be a visual clue on her friend’s face of any pieces she’s managing to put together. There is nothing immediately visible, though, and Debbie reaches blindly for a subject change instead. “Hey, I have a comparison paper to write on Hogwarts and the Muggle school system for Muggle Studies. You went to a Muggle school before you got your letter, right?”

There is a moment of hesitation that hovers in between all four of them, as they all acknowledge that Debbie has changed the topic, but nobody says a word. Finally, Nine-Ball blinks slowly and nods. “Yeah,” she says, and answers every question Debbie fires at her until breakfast is over, allowing her to scribble vague notes on a scrap of parchment. This has the added bonus of lessening the amount of research she’ll have to do  _ and _ meaning she won’t have to waste her time with Tammy on asking  _ her _ these questions, and she departs in the direction of Care of Magical Creatures feeling rather pleased with how she handled the whole thing.

She finds herself avoiding spending too much time with her friends, and feels particularly guilt-ridden about it. Sixth year means their courses are tricky enough that she can claim she has too much work to do without raising suspicion, and she takes advantage of that more than she should. “I feel bad. I mean, they’re my best friends, and I love them, obviously,” she tells Tammy. They sit closer together now, so sometimes their arms touch when they move or breathe, like they need some kind of reassurance that the other person is really there. “I just feel like I can’t talk to them about as much anymore.” 

_ I’d rather be here with you, _ is what she doesn’t say out loud.

If she thinks about that too hard, it scares her.

Debbie practices taking precautions to deal with this fear – or, at the very least, to keep it from setting in too deeply. She tears her gaze away when she finds herself just  _ looking _ at Tammy, because sometimes when Tammy looks back, it feels like time freezes altogether. She holds her breath when tutoring involves Tammy leaning across the desk to explain something, because she always smells like cinnamon and new books and vanilla shampoo. She skips the Ravenclaw match against Hufflepuff because she has always maintained the opinion that Quidditch is hyped up more than it needs to be, and it would be noticeable if she began to attend games when none of her friends are playing. At meals, she seeks Tammy out immediately, just to be sure she can resolutely not look in that direction. Some days, her friends and Tammy’s choose the same table, and Debbie is, sickeningly, a little grateful for the animosity between Lou and Daphne. It means that they don’t sit anywhere near each other, which makes it a hundred times easier to pretend not to see Tammy at all. Which, in turn, means that nobody suspects that there is anything going on at all.

Still, Debbie feels like it is incredibly,  _ glaringly _ obvious. She is so acutely aware of Tammy Prescott now, in a way she never thought she might be. Half of the thoughts in her head can be connected back to the blonde, and she doesn’t know how to stop them. She catches herself starting to smile when she can hear Tammy’s voice across a classroom. She lends Tammy one of her mother’s books, and Tammy returns it three days later in pristine condition, and then Debbie locks it back into her trunk where nobody else can touch it. Whatever is going on, it feels increasingly clear, something that she is constantly surprised nobody else picks up on.

Claude smoothly corners her after charms, just when she is free for the day. “Hey,” he says, with all the confidence of a pureblood boy who never hears the word  _ no.  _ “Can we talk?”

Swiftly, Debbie glances around. Her friends have all stopped in their tracks where they were trailing out of the room in her wake, Constance’s arms crossed over her chest, Nine-Ball looking unimpressed. Lou is the most composed of them all – has to be, considering they share a common room and a Quidditch team – but narrows her eyes at him for just a moment, gaze finding Debbie a moment later.  _ You don’t have to, _ her eyes say. Debbie knows her well enough to be able to read that.

And behind them, she sees Tammy. Tammy who is everywhere, who Debbie is forever searching out without thinking about it. Her eyes sweep over Claude from head to toe and her arms tighten around the textbooks she holds, and she slips wordlessly around Nine-Ball to catch up to Amita. They disappear around the corner and Debbie turns back to Claude, holds her head high. 

“Yeah, sure. What’s up?”

He hesitates. Claude Becker is not the type to hesitate, and it surprises her, takes a moment to register. Maybe she crushed a little of his spirit when she broke up with him. Or maybe it’s just the general unwillingness of her friends to clear away. Or maybe it’s a little of both. “Alone?” he asks, and Debbie only raises one eyebrow. Doesn’t move, and he falters for a moment longer before drawing himself up. “I’ve been thinking a lot about us, and I’d like to give it another shot.”

She freezes, for a moment. Isn’t sure how long that moment lasts. When she manages to unstick herself, the only words she can get out are a sort of distasteful, “I broke up with  _ you,  _ Claude, remember?”

This makes something in his shoulders visibly deflate, and it gives her a savage sort of pleasure. “But,” he starts, already reaching out to hold onto her white-knuckled, hand tightening around her arm just above the elbow. In an urgent, low voice, he carries on, “Deb, I don’t think you underst–“

“Claude,” she cuts him off through a sigh. She gives him a tight smile that doesn’t reach her eyes, reaches up to pry his fingers away from her arm. “I’m really, definitely not interested. Take the hint, okay?” She speaks too loudly on purpose, knowing that he will not want to draw out the rejection any longer than necessary when there are so many other people in earshot. And she’s right – he releases her like he’s been burned.

As they file away from him, Lou places one arm loosely around Debbie’s shoulders and grins, blue eyes sparkling. “I’m proud of you, babe.”

She can’t figure out if she feels more grateful for Lou’s existence in that moment, or just filled with shame attached to all the things she hasn’t told Lou since the school year began. Since even before that – August when she wrote to Tammy, or July when her mother died, or June when she started to trust Tammy with things. Things that Lou used to be the only person to know.

Late at night, something about Tammy seems off, and Debbie can’t figure out what has caused it. “Are you okay?” she asks, some entity in the shadowy parts of her head marveling at the way that this is now a question she can ask, even if she can only ask it in one place. One and a half, if she counts the transfiguration classroom. But Tammy only nods absently and pulls her knees up to her chest, wrapping her arms around them to curl into a little ball. 

“Just thinking,” she answers.

Debbie doesn’t push it any farther. That’s how they  _ work. _ They don’t poke and prod at each other for information; they wait until the words are ready to come out on their own.

These words, specifically, are not ready for two more nights. It’s not as if they haven’t been talking – Debbie doesn’t think she remembers how to be around Tammy  _ without _ being able to talk. But tonight, Tammy looks at her curiously once, twice, three times, and then: “Are you and Claude Becker getting back together?”

The question catches Debbie off guard. That isn’t how this works. They don’t pick and choose questions out of the blue like that. She frowns slightly. “Why would you ask me that?” It’s quiet, even for here. The skies have opened up to shower rain down over the castle, and the drops pitter-patter on the roof over the spot where they sit, threatening to drown out the words.

Tammy shrugs, and her shoulder brushes Debbie’s as she does. “I don’t know. I just saw you talking to him after charms the other day, and I thought maybe…” She trails off, shrugs again. She isn’t looking at Debbie; their roles have been reversed, Tammy looking out over the grounds and Debbie looking at Tammy. There is only a little light from the stairwell to see by, and the stars are scarce tonight, but she can see her side profile clearly enough. She has longer eyelashes than Debbie ever realized before this moment. “It’s okay if you are, you know. I mean – well, obviously. Whatever makes you happy.” 

A million things click into place all at once.

“Tammy,” she says quietly, seriously enough that Tammy actually does turn her head to look. Her eyes are wide and inky dark in this light, and Debbie leans and Tammy doesn’t move except for her eyelids to flutter softly closed, and then Debbie is kissing her.

She has never kissed a girl before. Not for real, not anywhere else outside of a hazy dreamland. Tammy’s lips are soft and warm and when she breathes in, her head is filled with all the things she already knows Tammy smells like, only tenfold. When she pulls back again, unwilling to open her eyes and come back to reality, she feels dizzy in the best possible way.

She’s not sure who moves to close the gap between them again first. Maybe they have fallen in tune with each other enough for it to be both. She doesn’t know how long it lasts, only that her hands move up to frame Tammy’s face and then work themselves into her hair, and that she is remarkably aware of Tammy’s fingertips over her waist, just under her ribcage. Can feel the touch through the sweater she’s wearing and, distantly, thinks that every single sweater she owns has to have some memory of Tammy woven into it by this point.  _ Likes _ that.

Kissing Tammy Prescott is overwhelming. Being kissed  _ back _ by Tammy Prescott is all-consuming. Everything else seems to slow down and fall away. Maybe time stops altogether.

This is a hundred times different than kissing Claude, and probably a hundred _ thousand _ times better. It’s not that she doesn’t want to kiss boys – she’s only ever done that before, only knew that until now – but she has decidedly not allowed herself to think too hard about kissing girls. About what it might  _ mean _ that she sometimes imagines it. For right now, none of that really matters. It all falls away, too. All that remains is Tammy: The only person in the whole world who she wants to kiss, maybe forever.

Debbie angles her head to the left so she can deepen the kiss, breathe in  _ more _ of her, embed everything about this into her head so she never loses it. Curling her fingers tighter into Tammy’s hair, she presses herself as close to the other girl as she can manage, and the rain falling around them bounces off the stone floor just outside the roof’s reach. Tammy tastes like honey and like peppermint toothpaste, a strange combination but one that Debbie imprints into her memory, and when their tongues touch for the first time, there is a low, involuntary hum in the back of Tammy’s throat, and this is what brings Debbie crashing back down to earth.

With a gasp, she pulls away and steadfastly looks straight ahead, out over the lake and into the mountains. What the  _ hell _ is she doing? All she can think about is kissing Tammy again, and that is completely out of the question. She stays perfectly still until her breathing returns to normal, listening to Tammy trying to catch her breath next to her.

“Debbie,” says Tammy, perhaps more timid than Debbie has ever heard her. She’s up in a flash, feet underneath her and legs straightening, and then she just keeps going. “Debbie,” says Tammy again, stronger now. She moves instinctively for the door, all the stairs beyond it and the inviting quality they hold of _ not being here _ . “Debbie, wait.”

She doesn’t answer, only runs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THINGS ARE HAPPENING, GUYS. also, debbie is an idiot. that's the entire plot of this fic, truly.
> 
> comments are much appreciated and make all my writing-focused brain cells very happy! they need that. if you can spare five seconds of your time to leave kudos or tell me what you thought of this chapter, it literally makes my whole week!
> 
> thank you for reading, as always, and i'll see you next time, when debbie... hopefully... gets her shit together. just a little bit.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> on the outside, things go back to normal. the normal from before the end of fifth year, back when they didn't speak to each other at all. only it's not normal, not anymore. not when tammy knows what feels like an infinite number of facts about debbie and the way her shoulders move when she breathes and what she tastes like. all she wants is to talk to debbie, just once more, just to sort out whatever is going on. or whatever is not going on. just enough for closure, though maybe they were never enough to warrant that. (okay, that’s a lie. she doesn’t want closure. she wants the newer kind of normal back.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay, this is a sort of short chapter, but i felt bad for leaving you guys with the end of the last one for too long. so here we go!

One moment Debbie is everywhere, overtaking every single one of Tammy’s senses, and the next she is gone. All she leaves in her wake is a lack of oxygen. On a sharp inhale, Tammy tries again. “Debbie,” she says, too quiet and too weak. The only answer is the door clicking shut behind the other girl. Slowly, she reaches up to press her fingers to her mouth, just where Debbie’s lips were. They feel cool with the absence of her.

Debbie Ocean  _ kissed _ her.

She just needs a moment to collect herself.

She thinks she has wanted this since the beginning. At least since before summer break, before that last night up here of fifth year, when she slipped her address into Debbie’s pocket, holding her breath and moving slow and careful so she wouldn’t notice until later. Tammy knows herself well enough to be able to pick up on her own feelings, that they have existed and aimed themselves in Debbie’s direction for months now. That is not the surprising part about this development. 

No, the surprising part is  _ Debbie. _ Debbie who is hesitant to let people in, who has been slowly but surely opening herself up to Tammy bit by agonizing bit, who kissed her tonight like it made her remember how to breathe. Every step down the stairs and back up to her dormitory, Tammy searches the shadows for her. Like maybe she will be waiting, like maybe she will be finished running. But the shadows are all empty, and sleep is out of the question. She lies in her bed, eyes wide as she looks up to the ceiling, and imagines kissing Debbie again, a far-off not-real idea that is, she is quite sure, impossibly out of reach – especially after the speed with which she put distance between them after.

Debbie is not at breakfast in the morning; she knows because she has gained the habit, this year, of searching a room for the other girl when she walks in. Her friends sit at the Slytherin table, and there is an empty space where Debbie should be. Tammy sits at the Ravenclaw table alone, until her own friends usher a handful of third-years out of the way to slide into seats opposite hers. They were with the Hufflepuffs, when she got here. Their seats are empty now.

“Are you okay?” asks Amita, and for a split second there, she almost breaks. It’s the worried knit of her friend’s eyebrows as she looks across the table, maybe.

Tammy blinks. “Yeah, I’m fine.” It sounds hollow. She feels disconnected, as if there is a layer of glass between herself and everything else. “Just tired, is all. I didn’t sleep well.”

_ Understatement of the century. _

She can’t focus on anything all day. Or she can, but only on the fact that Debbie misses every class they have together. Constance Hong weaves her way into the transfiguration classroom at the end of their lesson and Tammy lingers for a bit longer, takes her time replacing each of her books and quills into her bag. 

“Hey, Professor C,” she greets the teacher, as if they are on good terms despite Constance not being in NEWT-level transfiguration. “Debbie’s sick, so I said I’d come get whatever she missed.”

Sick. That settles it, doesn’t it? The kiss was a mistake, a mistake significant enough that Debbie needs to avoid it. This is a conclusion only proven by the Gryffindor girl not setting foot on the astronomy tower after dark that night; Tammy waits for an hour, watching the rain, trying not to picture last night. Walks back to her common room slowly, like Debbie is going to appear out of nowhere along the way, feeling rather like a bird with clipped wings. 

Debbie returns to the world outside of Gryffindor Tower not the next day, but the day after that. She doesn’t meet Tammy’s eyes all day, which is nothing new, but she also doesn’t come to the tower. On Saturday, Tammy stops going, too. Maybe this is the end of whatever friendship they had going for them, whatever connection they formed. 

Maybe something that only exists at night is simply not enough.

On Monday, she hangs back after transfiguration and hovers in front of Professor Chang’s desk until the silence is too much. “I can’t tutor anymore,” she blurts out. Can’t bring herself to speak Debbie’s name. “I’m really sorry. I just have so much going on, you know, with sixth year and Quidditch and everything, and I just – well – I have too much on my plate, I guess.” Guiltily, she visits Professor Weasley in her office after dinner, too, tells her the same thing for the younger kids she’s tutoring in charms. She turns on her heel and disappears back to the Ravenclaw common room then, as if her head of house can’t follow her there.

To her credit, Professor Weasley does nothing of the kind. She only passes the word along to the handful of students Tammy has been tutoring for her, and one of them – a fourth-year Gryffindor boy with freckles dotting every inch of his skin – bumps into her purposefully in the library the next day, looking perpetually stressed out as he adjusts his grip on a stack of books. “I don’t know how I’m going to get this essay done,” he sighs, and she takes pity on him and follows him back to his seat to look over what he has so far, anyway.

In the Quidditch game against Slytherin the following weekend, she fumbles on easy saves and they lose by a landslide. Daphne alternates between looking particularly smug about this and frowning deeply in Tammy’s direction. “You’re so distracted lately,” she points out, as if this is something Tammy has not yet realized. “Are you  _ sure _ you’re okay?”

As she has been for a week and three days, Tammy forces a nod. “I’m okay,” she lies through her teeth.

It would be easier, she thinks, to be angry with Debbie for doing this to her. For mixing everything up in her head and then flat-out disappearing from her life. She isn’t sure she can be mad at Debbie for more than five minutes, though. She only  _ misses _ her.

On the outside, things go back to normal. The normal from before the end of fifth year, back when they didn’t speak to each other at all. Only it’s  _ not _ normal, not anymore. Not when Tammy knows what feels like an infinite number of facts about Debbie and the way her shoulders move when she breathes and what she tastes like. This brings a profound sense of loss that Tammy can’t seem to shake. She sleeps even less than she has all year – when she closes her eyes, it’s either Debbie or her father, or sometimes both. In an effort to shut out all of these images, she doubles down on her homework, goes above and beyond, even for her. 

A week and four days. She goes back to the astronomy tower tonight, unwilling to hold onto a shred of hope that Debbie might be there, but just to see if being there still helps, even without her. It does, a little. It’s raining again, and Tammy sits against the wall right next to the door, watching the raindrops fall in the dark and letting the sound of them lull her into calm. She dozes off briefly and wakes up with a pain where her neck meets her shoulder from sleeping like this, but it is sleep, nonetheless. All she wants is to talk to Debbie, just once more, just to sort out whatever is going on. Or whatever is  _ not  _ going on. Just enough for closure, though maybe they were never enough to warrant that.

(Okay, that’s a lie. She doesn’t want closure. She wants the newer kind of normal back.)

A week and five days. She sees Debbie in the library, corners her in the alchemy section where no one else can see them. “You’re avoiding me,” she whispers, and doesn’t phrase it like a question.

Reflexively, Debbie frowns. Tammy knows this is coming; she is prepared for it. Before last May, she would never have thought anything Debbie does to be  _ predictable _ . Is this a sign that Tammy knows her better now than she used to? “I am not. You’re the one who stopped showing up for tutoring,” she hisses back.

“That’s not about you,” says Tammy unconvincingly, crossing her arms over her chest as if to shield herself. “I stopped tutoring some other people, too.” It’s true on paper; the lie is that it’s not about Debbie, specifically. She isn’t going to dwell on that now, though. Not when Debbie is closer to her than she has been in a week and five days. “Listen, you can’t just do – what you did – and then cut me out like this. It’s not fair. I have feelings.”

“Tammy? Where did you go?” Rose is terrible at whispering, cannot contain words with the low volume needed for it. Her voice carries clearly from three aisles over.

Each of Debbie’s muscles tightens individually. She’s going to run. Fight or flight only has one real answer when it comes to the two of them, and evidently, it’s flight every time. “I have to go,” she sighs. She steps back and hits the bookshelf behind her, regains her balance, gaze fixed on Tammy’s. “I’m not avoiding you. I just have a lot to think about.”

Tammy holds her eyes for a moment longer. “There are some good places around here to do that,” she replies, as meaningfully as she can manage. They both know exactly where she means. 

By the time Rose rounds the corner, Debbie is gone. She has a knack for disappearing like that, leaving no traces behind. Tammy pulls a book from the shelf and flips absentmindedly to its index, as if she’s searching for something in particular. Replaces it on the shelf and offers Rose a tiny smile, follows her back to their table, and tries to push Debbie out of her head to make space for her potions essay.

She can’t sleep, again. Lying on one side to face the wall, keeping her breathing even as the other Ravenclaw sixth-year girls crawl into their own beds one by one, she waits. The seconds move too slowly, painstakingly counting down to midnight, and she listens past the sound of Nine-Ball’s light snores to hear the second years’ hushed giggles as they return from their late-night astronomy class. Ten more minutes to allow for Professor Reyes to clear up her things, and then Tammy is quietly pushing back her covers and stealing out of her dormitory. She pulls her coat over her pyjamas as she moves, takes her time getting to the base of the astronomy tower with her heart pounding erratically in her chest.

Debbie isn’t there. She tries to talk herself down as she waits; maybe she won’t show up at all, like those first few days in September. The recognition in her eyes when Tammy vaguely mentioned the tower doesn’t  _ necessarily _ mean she will be here. Tammy puts her hands in her pockets and sits on the flagstone, just so she can’t see her fingers shaking.  _ It’s okay if she doesn’t come, _ she tells herself, over and over, repeating it like a mantra because she needs the reminder.  _ It’s okay if she doesn’t come. _

She does, though.

When she appears in the doorway there, Tammy’s heart skips a beat, which is ridiculous because she has already resigned herself to the understanding that they are not  _ that. _ Scrambling up to stand, Tammy smiles, small and hesitant and uncertain. “Hey.”

Debbie’s eyes lock in on hers and she momentarily forgets how to breathe. “Hi,” she answers, her voice cutting through the thick fog preventing Tammy from doing anything normal like breathing or moving or thinking clearly. She takes a step forward and Tammy steps back, and then again, and again, and somehow this ends in Tammy’s back hitting the solid wall so she stops. Debbie is  _ so close  _ to her, no truly coherent thoughts are making it to the surface anymore.

“What are you,” she starts in a mumble, but then one of Debbie’s hands slides into her jacket and the other tips her chin just slightly upward and  _ oh, _ they’re kissing again, and any questions she had simply evaporate right out of her head. Maybe she has only kissed Debbie once before, but there is a familiarity to this, like this is exactly what she is meant to be doing. Fumbling a little, she pulls her hands from her pockets and uses them to draw Debbie closer, as close as she can get.

It’s over too soon, and she doesn’t loosen her hold around Debbie’s waist, but this time, the other girl doesn’t make a move to leave. “Is… was that okay?” she asks, very quietly.

As smoothly as she can manage (which, realistically, is not particularly smoothly), Tammy moves her hands up to tangle into dark hair and nods shakily. Her nose bumps against Debbie’s in the dark. “Yes,” she whispers back. This third kiss, she initiates. It’s slow, hesitant, like maybe she is afraid of scaring Debbie away again, just in case this is not a dream. When it ends, her sightline flickers all over Debbie’s face. She is, somehow, even more beautiful up close, which seems sort of unfair. She’s still got her eyes closed, pink lips slightly parted, cheeks maybe a little flushed. It’s hard to tell when it’s dark out and the only light comes from the doorway to her left. Before she can tense up again, Tammy says softly, “Please don’t run away again.”

Debbie shakes her head, exhales on the smallest of laughs. “I’m not going anywhere.” And she doesn’t – she stays exactly where she is, pressing Tammy up against the wall behind her, so close that Tammy swears she can feel her heartbeat. “Sorry for running before. Old habits die hard.”

Tammy kisses her again, brief and fleeting. She doesn’t think she’ll ever get enough of that. “I really like you, Debbie Ocean.” Her heart jumps erratically at the admission, and she wonders if Debbie can feel that, too.

Slowly, wonderingly, Debbie brushes a piece of blonde hair behind her ear, fingertips smoothing down over it. “I really like you, too, Tammy Prescott,” she echoes back.

Tammy tries to contain her smile. “Okay.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> soft shit, you guys.
> 
> comments and kudos and general love make me happy! (i've always felt sort of weird about mentioning this, like i'm begging for attention or something, but i'm trying to learn how to be better about casually dropping sentences like this at the end of chapters. we'll see how long that lasts, lmao.)


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> as distant as she is from them, her friends still know her well enough to pick up on a change, here and there. lou is particularly good at this, has known debbie forever and is never going to stop, even if debbie keeps adding things to the list of secrets she cannot tell her. “what’s going on with you, anyway?” she asks towards the end of november. debbie’s eyes flicker away, and lou follows them across the great hall, and for one heartstopping moment, she thinks lou is about to figure it all out. but when the blonde turns back, eyes wide, she’s come to a different conclusion altogether. “please tell me you and becker aren’t a thing again,” she groans.
> 
> startled, debbie casts her gaze back the way she was looking before. her eyes are drawn to tammy, at the ravenclaw table – but beyond her, over her right shoulder, is claude. “shit, no. no way. never,” she reassures her best friend. wonders if she still has the right to call lou that, when she is so unwilling to tell her the biggest thing going on in her life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i swear, time is just dragging. i feel like it's been at least a week since my last post, and it's been 4 days. god. okay. it's not a super long chapter, but here we go!
> 
> this chapter's characterization of debbie's general aversion to change and unpredictability: brought to you by the image of debbie ocean, sitting in solitary confinement and running a job in her head over and over until it ran like clockwork, until she'd prepared for any possible situation. debbie needs her routine and she needs that predictable quality from day to day, i just know it.

Strictly speaking, Debbie Ocean does not like change. This dates all the way back into her childhood – one stuffed animal switched out for another one bringing on tears, a routine not followed sending the entire day spiralling into chaos. Losing her mother has been the biggest and most terrifying change thus far; it changes a countless number of other things, too, a ripple effect. It has been four months now and she is still turning over stones and finding other, unexpected aspects of her life that are different. She thinks maybe she will be finding things like this for longer than she can possibly comprehend. Change doesn’t sit comfortably with her. It feels like it throws her off-balance, makes everything more difficult. Debbie likes to think she is ready for anything, but the truth is that she can only feel that way if she has had the time to prepare for every potential outcome. She is resistant to change in every form she finds it.

Tammy, though. Tammy is a welcome change, one that she opens her arms to. She doesn’t think she has ever encountered one of those before.

With Tammy, the changes feel natural, a slow evolution, like she is only discovering what her life is meant to be like. First it’s that the other girl is someone who she can talk to, someone who understands what she’s talking  _ about. _ For a while, this is quite enough of a change for her. Then it’s the summer, the way that she can’t talk to anyone but somehow, unexpectedly, writing that letter to Tammy feels manageable. Autumn brings an innumerable slew of hushed conversations and secrets shared, and that is another change. And then there are the feelings, some of which Debbie still doesn’t quite know how to describe.

They don’t just talk all night, now. This is the most recent change – that they are constantly touching each other now. Debbie’s fingers interlocked with Tammy’s, or Tammy’s head resting on Debbie’s shoulder, or their arms pressed up against each other, as if maybe they both need the feeling of security that comes along with it. She kisses Tammy until she runs out of air, begins to memorize the exact motions of it, the brush of Tammy’s lips on hers, the way all her breath catches in her throat in the hazy moments in between one kiss and the next. They go slow and careful, like one of them is breakable, or maybe both. Being with Tammy in this way is exhilarating, breathtaking, though Debbie is unable to put words to it.

The only person she can talk to about Tammy,  _ is _ Tammy. This is isolating; she becomes, if possible, even more disjointed from her friends, something that she never thought carried even the most remote of risks. Having someone fill the role Tammy is beginning to fill, the role that Debbie is afraid to put a label to, means she is practically bursting at the seams. She wants to tell  _ someone _ – Constance or Nine-Ball or Lou,  _ especially _ Lou – but every time one of them catches a glimpse of Tammy’s friends across a room, the reality of their situation is thrown into the light. Half the words out of Lou’s mouth are about how thoroughly she never wants to be in the same space as Daphne Kluger ever again after they graduate, and with a sinking stomach, Debbie knows that her friends and Tammy’s are never going to get along. Not if the only reason is  _ them. _ She and Tammy are a lot of things, but being the glue to hold an already-frayed group of girls together is not one of them.

Besides, doing something like holding Tammy’s hand in public is out of the question. Some things, she will only allow herself in the shadows.

As distant as she is from them, her friends still know her well enough to pick up on a change, here and there. Lou is particularly good at this, has known Debbie forever and is never going to stop, even if Debbie keeps adding things to the list of secrets she cannot tell her. “What’s going on with you, anyway?” she asks towards the end of November, stealing a sip from Debbie’s water and raising her eyebrows over the rim of the goblet. Debbie’s eyes flicker away, and Lou follows them across the Great Hall, and for one heartstopping moment, she thinks Lou is about to figure it all out. But when the blonde turns back, eyes wide, she’s come to a different conclusion altogether.  _ “Please _ tell me you and Becker aren’t a thing again,” she groans.

Startled, Debbie casts her gaze back the way she was looking before. Her eyes are drawn to Tammy, at the Ravenclaw table alone – as a prefect, she doesn’t like to set a bad example for the younger students by flouting the rules at  _ every _ meal – but beyond her, over her right shoulder, is Claude. “Shit,  _ no. _ No way. Never,” she reassures her best friend. Wonders if she still has the right to call Lou that, when she is so unwilling to tell her the biggest thing going on in her life.

This is, of course, not  _ nearly _ enough to appease Lou’s curiosity. “What is it, then?”

Shrugging, Debbie tries to clear every emotion from her face, hoping that whatever tell Lou can pick out from a mile away doesn’t make an appearance. “I’m just thinking about that transfiguration test. I’m probably going to bomb, now that Prescott stopped tutoring people.”

Lou spears a piece of broccoli with her fork and points it accusingly at her. “You’re lying,” she says firmly, but she doesn’t push for anything else. Then, as an afterthought: “You’re not going to bomb. You never needed a tutor, anyway. Chang just didn’t realize you’re actually the most brilliant transfiguration student in our year, ‘cause you never showed up.”

Debbie smiles, taking hold of the opportunity for a change in subject. “Just in our year?”

“Don’t push it, Ocean.”

In the end, Lou is right – she doesn’t fail the test, though she tells Tammy after they’ve received their marks that she thinks she could have done better (“If I still had a tutor, I mean,” she adds loftily, bumping one shoulder playfully into hers because it makes Tammy smile). Professor Chang has backed off, for the most part, satisfied with Debbie’s grades and attendance rising. It’s still difficult to be there, though, in that room, to think about their new teacher taking up all the spaces that her mother used to occupy. A darkness hangs over her when she moves into the classroom, threatening to take over if she focuses too hard on all of that, and it tends to distract her from paying proper attention.

“I guess I could tutor you again,” muses Tammy, fingertips ghosting over Debbie’s arm from elbow to wrist. Her hands are always moving, finding new and different paths to trace. “I should probably tell you I definitely stopped because of you. Mostly.”

“Knew it.” Debbie grins. She’s been smiling more, lately. Feels a little guilty for it sometimes, which is something they have talked about. Tammy likes to say that her dad and Debbie’s mum want them to smile. That maybe they look down on the two of them, their place at the top of this tower, and smile, too, because the parents they have lost want them to be  _ happy. _ Just like Debbie’s mother said in St Mungo’s.  _ I think maybe I just want you to be happy, too. _ “You don’t have to, really. I know it takes up tons of your study time.”

Tammy shakes her head. “I like doing it. I kind of miss all those kids, anyway,” she admits. Ducks her head down a little only to rise back up and steal a swift kiss that Debbie eagerly returns. “Besides,” she mumbles against Debbie’s mouth, “it’s extra time with you. Like, not here.”

There is no answering that, mostly because Debbie is entirely too busy kissing her back. Somehow, this turns into  _ more _ without either of them stopping to think. She shifts overtop of Tammy with one leg on each side of her, creating a sort of intoxicating new angle that allows the kiss to deepen significantly. Tammy hums softly, the way that Debbie has gotten accustomed to; it doesn’t scare her off anymore, not like it did the first time. It feels as if her heart is slamming against her ribcage, jumping when Tammy’s hands slip underneath her sweater, underneath the hem of her shirt.

This is new. She has thought about this but not felt it before, envisioned how it will be. Tammy’s hands are cooler than she imagined – it is, after all, early December now – and they trace up her spine and back down again, drawing a gasp. Debbie curls to press her lips to Tammy’s cheek, jaw, neck, and then –

“Oh. Oh, my God. Holy crap.”

For a moment, as they tear themselves apart and Debbie tries to focus in on the silhouetted figure at the top of the stairs, it seems like everything freezes. This moment lasts just long enough for her to place who it is: John Frazier. He stands open-mouthed, frowning, hand on the door like he needs it to hold himself up.

Then the moment is over and Debbie is moving,  _ fast, _ scrambling off Tammy’s lap to cross from their spot by the railing to where John stands, a little shell-shocked. Tammy is very still behind her, still seated, her eyes screwed shut like she’s bracing herself for the worst. “John,” hisses Debbie, faint but urgent, drawing the edges of her sweater tight around herself. It is colder up here now that she isn’t focused solely on Tammy. “John, look at me. You can’t tell anyone.”

His mum was a friend of hers. She has spent countless Christmas parties and New Year’s parties in his general vicinity, even if she was always paying attention only to Lou at those types of events. He used to be sort of fun, in a quirky sort of way, when they were little kids. Not  _ cool, _ not by a long shot, but entertaining. He has grown into this quality over time, she thinks. His entire family attended her mother’s funeral, dressed up in black. They dropped off casseroles at her house when her father was at work and hovered uncertainly at the door like they weren’t quite sure whether they should attempt to hug her or not.

So maybe John, himself, is not Debbie’s friend – not in the technical sense of the word – but she thinks she knows him well enough that she might be able to convince him to keep his mouth shut. Her panic has not set in enough to be debilitating, but rather  _ just enough _ to sharpen her, to allow her to focus. “John, please.”

Perhaps he sees a hint of the hysteria raging just beneath the surface, because he sighs, nostrils flaring. Leans around her to intone, “You’re a  _ prefect, _ Tammy, you’re better than this.” Tammy smiles tightly, eyes still closed, and he straightens up again, squares his shoulders as he looks back to Debbie. “I won’t tell anyone,” he promises, and the relief that sweeps over her feels solid, tangible. “I’m going to have to dock points, obviously, but I won’t tell.”

She doesn’t even care about the points.

John leaves them there, casting one last meaningful look between the two of them, even going so far as to shoot a tiny smile in Debbie’s direction before he disappears. She’s on edge when she sits down again, placing a little physical distance between herself and Tammy, a visible barrier.

“You trust him not to tell anyone?” Tammy’s voice is small. Debbie only nods. The boy is all about keeping his word, never got away with a thing as a kid because he couldn’t fathom the concept of lying. It’s something that makes him a good fit for Head Boy, she thinks. “Okay,” says Tammy.

She doesn’t ask the question, but it’s right there, waiting. If anyone deserves the answer, it’s her.

Blinking out over the lake, Debbie nods decisively to herself. “I’ve never told anyone I like girls, too,” she confesses. “Never really had a girl to like, until – well, you.” This hangs in the air in front of her until a gust of wind whips it away. Tammy watches her seriously; Debbie wants to reach for her hand, but can’t seem to summon enough willpower to move. “I don’t think my family would like it much. My dad, I mean. Danny would probably be fine. I think I’ve just shut it down since I started to figure it out, tried not to think about it. It’s not something I’ve really worked out entirely, you know? I don’t think I’m ready to tell anyone else when I don’t even understand it all myself.”

Reading between the lines, it sounds like she’s saying that Tammy is just a stepping stone along some journey of self-discovery. But this is not what she means and, as always, she is grateful to the other girl for pulling the meaning from her words that was really intended.

“I told my mum two years ago,” says Tammy. Quiet, careful, in the way she so often is when she divulges information about herself. Debbie pictures Tammy’s mother, who she has seen a couple of times briefly, from a distance, like when she brought Tammy to the train station at the beginning of September. She imagines the woman and fourth-year Tammy, sitting together at a wide, wooden table, and talking about it. About  _ this. _ All the things that Tammy’s mum forged an understanding for straight off the bat, Debbie will not be able to talk about with  _ her  _ mother, ever.  “She was really supportive, actually. I was sort of worried she wouldn’t be, for some reason. I think it’s kind of terrifying, no matter what.”

Debbie nods, digging her teeth into the inside of her cheek. She has a question she wants to ask, but it’s proving difficult to form the words. Perhaps Tammy can sense this; she stays quiet, waiting patiently, leaving all the space that Debbie could possibly need to get the question out. “How did you… figure it out?” she manages. It comes out haltingly, and she can’t look at Tammy while she says it. “I mean, am I the – the first girl, for you, or…?”

“You’re not the first,” replies Tammy. She has her hands twisted together in her lap, and this is the only place where Debbie can bring herself to look. “The first was my best friend from, um, before Hogwarts. Sarah. We were together the summer before fourth year. A little bit the summer after. It was just, you know, hard, to keep up with a relationship when we were so far away from each other. And I couldn’t exactly tell her most of the things going on in my life, so…” She shrugs, gesturing around them. The tower, the castle, the wizarding world. When she speaks up again, her voice has gone still quieter, so that Debbie has to shift a little closer just to hear her. “I think I’ve known for a long time. Not a question, really, just something that  _ is.  _ I’m not trying to hide it or anything; I just don’t advertise it. The important people all know.”

That sort of makes Debbie one of the important people, doesn’t it?

“I think I’ve known for a while, too,” she admits, “a couple years, maybe.” It has been something lurking in the back of her mind for that long, maybe. Something that she has thought about but only briefly, never for too long, never allowing it to get too deep. Sharing it with anyone at all has been unfathomable, but realizing and coming to terms with having feelings for Tammy, specifically, hasn’t been a shock, not in that sense. “I just never knew how to acknowledge it properly. I think I’m still just scared.”

Tammy takes one of her hands gingerly in both of hers, brings it up to press her lips carefully to Debbie’s knuckles. “It’s okay to be scared,” she says, in exactly the tone of voice that makes all Debbie’s fears rush out of her body. “I’m not going to push you into anything you don’t feel ready for. You can tell people tomorrow or next month or next year or never.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as always, comments and kudos and things are much appreciated! i would love to know your thoughts on this chapter and on the story so far. you can also follow or yell at me on twitter, it's @deboceans! which is singlehandedly the best @ i've ever had. i wanna give a shoutout to jobjoblgbt on tumblr for tracking me down there and sending me messages that make my whole entire day every time.
> 
> as always, thank you for reading! i forget to say that sometimes, but i always mean to. it makes me so happy that anyone would use any of their time at all to follow along with this weird au. i hope i'll see you next chapter, when the timeline stops being wonky and we finally reach the month of december.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "would you say this is, like, a first date?" she asks, all casual interest, rolling a foil candy wrapper into a little ball. looking at debbie while she waits for an answer seems like too much, and there’s a moment of hesitation where the question is too far out to take it back and tammy sort of wishes she didn’t ask, so she lets her eyes flicker awkwardly from the wrapper to debbie’s face and back again.
> 
> debbie smiles, though, the corners on one side of her mouth rising just slightly. this smile of hers is one of tammy’s favourites, she thinks. “maybe. do you want it to be?”
> 
> frowning in mock concentration, tammy shrugs. “maybe,” she echoes. carefully, focusing in on every detail, she catches a dark wave of debbie’s hair in between two fingers and tucks it behind her ear. “yes.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> are y'all ready for some soft shit?

In the next Quidditch match against Gryffindor, Tammy is hit with a misdirected Bludger and falls twenty feet to the ground. She wakes up in the hospital wing when the sky outside has already grown dark, and her friends are speaking in hushed whispers at her bedside. She’s hit her head and feels dizzy when she sits up, but the Skele-Gro has already half-completed its work on her wrist and her ankle, and she is otherwise in decent shape.

All she can focus on is that Debbie does not come to see her.

She is released at lunchtime the next day, under strict orders not to push herself too hard. Still, she fills her Sunday afternoon with more homework than she should, aiming to make up for everything she planned to do after the Quidditch game that didn’t get done. Sixth year is too homework-heavy, and Tammy too perpetually stressed, to let it slide for even one weekend – even if that weekend is the one over which the entire school is shrouded in Christmas decorations.

Holed up in the common room, she does not emerge until just after midnight; John Frazier brings her food from the meals she misses, lingering like he wants to talk to her but instead casting a long look around the room and hurrying away. Tammy is grateful for that – she’s pretty sure he wants to talk about Debbie and the astronomy tower and the sneaking out past curfew, and she has no intention of putting an end to that.

At the top of the tower, Debbie wraps her arms tight around Tammy’s shoulders, nose pressing into her hair. “I was really worried about you,” she murmurs, words muffled by the way they are holding onto each other.

Tammy’s heart twists. Up until this moment, she thought maybe concern was the last thing on Debbie’s mind, like  _ that _ is the reason she didn’t come to the hospital wing. But it was only one day, and she’s here now, and she meant it when she told Debbie that she doesn’t want to push. Tomorrow or next month or next year or never. The timing doesn’t matter. The only important thing is here and now, her and Debbie. She thinks she could go forever without telling anyone at all, and that would be okay.

She’s wrong. As it turns out, acting on her feelings for someone like Debbie Ocean means wanting to  _ tell _ people about it. She wants to talk to somebody, anybody who will listen, about Debbie and the precise shade of brown in her eyes and how she feels butterfly wings in her stomach every time she sees her. She wants to stare at Debbie across every room and not have to worry about getting caught looking. If it was difficult to keep this secret before, it is exponentially harder now; the words all bubble up inside her and threaten to spill out each time she opens her mouth.

Any other time, her mother would be the best option – the endless letters back and forth, the lack of boundaries on what they can and cannot say to each other – but not this year. Not now. Not when their correspondence has stretched out more than ever before, letters arriving few and far between, less words on the pages than Tammy will ever get used to. The only other person she can think of is Sarah, but they haven’t spoken in over a year and when being a witch is the invisible thing that wedged itself in between them, she can’t exactly send the girl an owl. Professor Weasley is her head of house and favourite teacher, hands down, but that doesn’t seem like a real option. John Frazier already knows, but Tammy does not trust him as thoroughly as Debbie does. Daphne will not understand, simply because it is  _ Debbie, _ and Rose is downright terrible when it comes to keeping secrets.

This leaves Amita. Who, arguably, Tammy should have thought of earlier on. Amita Chandra is loyal to a fault, could talk for an eternity without spilling a single secret, would carry information all the way to the grave if she’s asked to. She’s also probably the least likely person to judge Tammy for this, out of perhaps anyone she knows at all. And once the thought of talking to Amita is in her head, she cannot shake it.

“I have to tell you something,” she tells the Hufflepuff one night, early, while astronomy classes are still occupying the tower. They are paired together for patrol, moving smoothly up one corridor and down another. She opens the conversation with this on purpose, so she can’t back out at the last second. “It’s a secret, though. Before I tell you, you have to  _ promise _ you won’t tell anyone.”

Amita’s eyes go wide. “Cross my heart and hope to die,” she swears, offering up her hand with the littlest finger extended. Tammy links their pinkies together. “I won’t tell a soul.”

Deep breath. “I sort of – I met someone,” she says on the exhale. The words are out in a blur, falling all over each other as they go. They feel like a weight lifting off her chest.

At this admission, Amita stops walking altogether. She grabs for the sleeve of Tammy’s robes, tugging her to a halt, as well. “You  _ what?” _ she squeaks. A wide smile spreads over her face, stretches all the way from one ear to the other. Amita’s eyes sparkle when she smiles like that, crinkle up at the corners. “Oh, my God. Okay. Tell me everything. Who is it? How did you meet?  _ Do I know her?” _

Colour seeps in all around Tammy’s cheeks, and she can’t hold back an answering smile. A hundred million words about Debbie rise up to the surface and she feels lighter than air, like she could float away through the stone walls and up past their spot and into the sky. “Slow down, slow down,” she tries, prying her friend’s fingers from her sleeve and gesturing for her to follow as they keep moving. “I can’t tell you everything. It’s – complicated. She doesn’t want to tell anyone yet.” Amita’s already opening her mouth to protest, and Tammy shakes her head quickly. “It’s okay, it’s not, like, one of those things. I’m fine. Don’t worry about it, okay? I-I really like her.”

Her friend looks at her carefully, eyes searching Tammy’s face. “Okay,” she decides. “I’m not worried. Let me know if anything changes and I should be, though?” Only once Tammy nods does she smile again, bright and easy. “I’ve gotta say, I kind of love being in the loop on this. Tell me something about her. Something that won’t give away who she is.”

So yes, Amita is definitely the right person to have told.

— • —

There is one last Hogsmeade trip in early December, the one that is essentially used for last-minute Christmas shopping each year. Tammy tucks her dark blue Ravenclaw scarf around herself before they leave the castle, and falls back purposefully several steps behind Daphne and Rose as they walk, Amita slowing automatically next to her. They are accustomed to this, giving their friends just a little extra space sometimes.

“If I were to ask you for a favour,” she starts hesitantly.

The other girl’s eyes glint knowingly. “I can cover for you,” she agrees, nodding. “Just tell me when.”

Which is how she winds up getting to spend time with Debbie Ocean, one-on-one, in real daylight. 

There is an alley a block away from the Hog’s Head, bordering close to the edge of the village, with a perfect little alcove hidden away in it. No windows and no clear view of it from the cobbled street, far enough away from the rows of more popular shops that all the noise drops off as she makes her way there. Debbie is already there when she slips down the alley, boasting a sizeable bag of Honeydukes candy. They sit together with Tammy’s legs draped over Debbie’s, going particularly still whenever they hear anyone nearby, and it works like a charm.

“Would you say this is, like, a first date?” she asks, all casual interest, rolling a foil candy wrapper into a little ball. Looking at Debbie while she waits for an answer seems like too much, and there’s a moment of hesitation where the question is too far out to take it back and Tammy sort of wishes she didn’t ask, so she lets her eyes flicker awkwardly from the wrapper to Debbie’s face and back again.

Debbie smiles, though, the corners on one side of her mouth rising just slightly. This smile of hers is one of Tammy’s favourites, she thinks. “Maybe. Do you want it to be?”

Frowning in mock concentration, Tammy shrugs. “Maybe,” she echoes. She can’t hold the serious expression for long, though – feels too staggeringly happy here to keep that mask up – and she cracks, grinning, a moment later. Carefully, focusing in on every detail, she catches a dark wave of Debbie’s hair in between two fingers and tucks it behind her ear. “Yes.”

There is a tiny pause where she thinks Debbie falters, but it passes. Perhaps she imagines it, to begin with. “All right. First date it is, then,” she agrees. Tammy tries not to linger on the maybe-pause, repeating the words in her mind instead. 

_ First date it is, then, _ she thinks, and kisses Debbie softly for the first time when the sun is still shining.

It’s both exciting and anxiety-inducing, having to hide away like this to be with Debbie somewhere besides the sanctuary of their tower. They get half an hour out of it before they have to untangle themselves and track down their respective friends, and when Tammy makes it back to hers, she is quite sure that they are going to be onto her. But nobody says a word, except Amita (“Did you find a good gift for your mum?”), and when she spots Debbie down the street later, everything looks like it’s gone smoothly for her, too.

She puts the candy wrapper, rolled tight into a nearly perfect sphere, in the top drawer of her nightstand. Feels a little ridiculous doing it, considering it’s garbage, but she was holding it when Debbie said today was their first date, and that makes it something she does not want to let go of.

— • —

Christmas break creeps up faster than Tammy has anticipated, until it is just on the horizon. Things have a tendency of doing that, when she is dreading them. 

She doesn’t think she has ever  _ dreaded _ going home for a break before. Christmas, Easter, the entire summer – she’s always rather liked them. Seeing her mum, spending time with the handful of her Muggle friends who have managed to stick around despite her vague details about boarding school, getting the time to breathe that she doesn’t often allow herself at Hogwarts.

This year, though, is different. There are the discouraging letters from her mother, the still-stinging loss of the house where she grew up, the isolated and stifling quiet of Nadine’s house for the last half of the summer. That place feels less like her home than anywhere Tammy has ever set foot. It’s temporary, but  _ how _ temporary? When she goes back there, will this disconnect she has been feeling from her mother, for the first time in her life, still be as evident as it seems now?

She has always felt comfortable enough at Hogwarts, but  _ more _ comfortable at home. Now she can’t help but worry that this statement has reversed itself. Home is no longer  _ her _ home, and there are Nadine and Oliver and their children roaming the house and not speaking to her, and if her mum is too busy to write to her with the frequency of previous years, maybe she will be too busy to spend time with Tammy, too. Hogwarts, for its part, has gained a lot, in her opinion. Mostly, it has gained Debbie.

“I think I’m going to miss coming up here,” she says into Debbie’s shoulder. A week and a half to go, until they board the Hogwarts Express back into London. 

Time feels warped, since the moment Debbie first kissed her. Sometimes it moves too quickly, making everything around it blur together, so she feels overwhelmed and does not have the time to think. Other times, it is slow, like the way things used to feel when she was seven years old and insisted on practicing her ballet routine in the swimming pool. Everything floats, hanging in the air for  _ almost _ too long, as if there is no gravity to pull it back down. It’s like she has known Debbie Ocean for the blink of an eye and an expansive, sprawled-out eternity all at once, and she cannot quite wrap her head around how that works.

One week until Christmas break. Debbie brings Tammy flowers stolen from one of the greenhouses, tied together at their stems with string in a careful, precise bow. Smiling wide, Tammy takes them, their fingers brushing in the process. She read a book over the summer about the meanings of different flowers, and the descriptions rise up to the surface of her mind as she looks at each one. “Did you know that gardenias mean secret love?” she asks, already knowing the answer. It’s a coincidence, of course. Still, she likes that the things they symbolize are present here, as if it could have been intentional, on someone’s part. Maybe it’s fate, in a way. “And daisies – daisies are innocence and purity and loyalty.”

The light isn’t good here, it never is. But she swears Debbie is blushing. “Shut up.”

Tammy smiles bigger.

She should tease Debbie for the colour flooding her cheeks, but she doesn’t. She thinks maybe if she brings it up, Debbie will quite purposefully never do it again. And she  _ likes _ this, the flowers, the rarity of the shy expression on the Gryffindor girl’s face as she holds them out. So she doesn’t say a word.

The next morning, she traces her fingers over the petals where the flowers sit in a water glass next to her bed. She picks out the daisy with the most perfect petals, and then the smallest and most beautiful gardenia, and tucks their stems into the top button hole of her shirt.

They peek out from the neckline of her robes at breakfast, the yellow petals of the gardenia matching the sunny centre of the daisy. Rose reaches out to adjust Tammy’s tie in the absent, maternal way she often does, eying the flowers curiously. “Those are beautiful. Where did they come from?” she inquires.

“Greenhouses,” she answers, without thinking. The cold December weather has snuffed out the chance of flowers like this growing anywhere else, but she is not a herbology student. It’s one of the classes that she and Debbie do not have in common. Scrambling for an explanation before anyone can question her, she shrugs. “I took a message down for Professor Lupin, and they were right there, so…”

“Stealing flowers now, huh?” Daphne rests her elbow on the table, her chin on her palm. The manicured nails of her other hand drum steadily on the tabletop. “Rebellious. In a sense, I mean. For you. Maybe there’s a little hope for you yet.”

Ironically, Professor Lupin chooses that afternoon to ask her to run down to the greenhouses with a message, for real. She makes it there just as he is dismissing class, spies Debbie filing out of Greenhouse Three and is intercepted by Amita. “The flowers are from  _ her, _ right?” she hisses, quietly enough that nobody else can hear, grinning broadly when the answer is a hesitant nod. “That’s  _ so cute! _ I love that.” Tammy catches Debbie’s eye briefly over her friend’s shoulder, notes how Debbie’s gaze slips downward to the flowers, mentally captures an image of the soft smile they curve over her lips.

She barely gets through the message for Professor Longbottom before his attention focuses there, too. Doesn’t miss the flicker of recognition in his eyes as he looks at the flowers, the curiosity he examines her with.

There are too many people who know, now, or suspect, or could know if they stumbled upon the right place at the right time. This is stressful in and of itself, though it somehow manages to be a little bit of a relief, too. It’s just more for Tammy to try to keep track of – she can talk to Amita if she doesn’t use Debbie’s name, and John knows but she doesn’t talk to him about it, and Professor Longbottom saw the flowers and could maybe guess, at least. She doesn’t tell Debbie about that one; he is her favourite teacher and the greenhouses are another safe place for her, she knows, one that she doesn’t want to tear away.

On the last night before the train pulls into the station down the winding lane, she sits with Debbie for longer than they have ever sat here before. Their feet stick out through the gaps in the railing, hanging comfortably like they are not hundreds of feet up, and they hold onto each other as if they need to stock up on the touches before spending three weeks apart, and they watch the sun rise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> phew. we've finally reached the start of christmas break. i think i might have made november, like, twice as long as it was actually supposed to be, but we'll just pretend that's still realistic. kudos or comments or whatever you have the time for would be extra appreciated, and you can always follow me on twitter @deboceans if you want to!
> 
> okay, self-promo time is over, for now. thank you for reading! see you next time, when we'll check in with debbie and the (remaining) oceans for christmas break.


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> tess stays at the house with her until danny arrives. she flits around the kitchen like she has belonged in this house forever, which she essentially has. when danny gets there, he sweeps in and spreads his arms wide ("honey, i'm home!") and kisses her on the cheek. then he strides across the kitchen and pulls debbie in for a hug so secure that it feels like it's stitching parts of her back together. he ruffles her hair when he releases her, grinning. "i missed you, little sister," he tells her grandly. "can't say i'm not happy to have graduated, but not being at hogwarts is weird. tell me about it. how's sixth year? what's the new gossip? are lou and daphne still gearing up to some duel that destroys the whole common room?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we're back! i'm going to go ahead and dedicate this chapter to belle for being so ridiculously lovely on twitter today. you're an angel, and i love you.

The Hogwarts Express pulls out of the station just after breakfast, and gets them to King’s Cross by mid-afternoon. Debbie fills the time with game after game of Exploding Snap, noise carrying out from her friends’ compartment and down the train. She sees Tammy moving past the compartment door twice on her rounds, though she doesn’t stop to tell them to keep it down. John does, once, and they reluctantly do for maybe ten minutes before the volume begins to rise again.

Lou nudges Debbie’s side with her foot in the down time between games, while Nine-Ball shuffles the cards. “You look exhausted,” she points out, not one to sidestep around the existence of shadowy circles beneath Debbie’s eyes. Shifting down the seat to wedge herself in as close to Lou as she can get, Debbie rests her head on her best friend’s shoulder. “Jesus. Did you sleep at  _ all?” _

“Nope,” she sighs, closing her eyes. Just for a moment, just until they’re ready to start the next game. “I’m just a little stressed, I guess. About seeing Danny and my dad, and not…” She trails off, and Lou nods in understanding, short blonde hair brushing against Debbie’s forehead. She’s thankful for this, the way she doesn’t have to finish the sentence.

She doesn’t breathe a word about Tammy, not now. Cannot wrap her head around how to describe what Tammy means to her, out loud, to her friends. Maybe after Christmas, something will change. Lou has been putting up with Daphne for Quidditch, at the very least, with relatively few bumps along the way. It’s a good sign, but she’s almost certain that it isn’t as easy as giving it  _ time. _ If it were, Lou and Daphne would have worked out all the problems between them years ago.

Tess is the one who picks her up from the train station, alone. She bites back her disappointment as she looks swiftly around to see if anyone else has noticed, but everyone seems too preoccupied with greeting their own families to pay much attention to the fact that Debbie Ocean is being picked up by her brother’s girlfriend. It’s not as if she doesn’t like Tess – they get along well enough, always have, that’s not the problem at all. It’s just that Danny isn’t there, or her father. She’d pick Danny, if she could, no question, but anything would be a step up from  _ neither _ of them.

“Hey, Debs.” Tess hugs her; she always does, has been a hugger as long as Debbie has known her. She’s also probably the only person who calls her  _ Debs, _ plural. Debbie thinks she wouldn’t like it, coming from anyone else. Tess maneuvers her trunk onto a luggage cart and sets Lilith’s cage securely on top, taking hold of the cart’s handles before Debbie can even make a move for them. “Danny couldn’t get off work early,” she says apologetically as they make their way off the platform. “The Auror department is running him into the ground, I swear. He’s excited to see you, though.”

She wishes Danny hadn’t moved out. Christmas break is going to be a nightmare, Debbie alone in a big house while everyone else works. Her father, Danny, Tess. Constance’s family is large and close-knit and takes up a great deal of her time, Nine-Ball is too far away up in Manchester, and Lou will be visiting her plethora of aunts and uncles and cousins based in Australia. Tammy will be the closest to her, but they both know that they won’t be able to see each other. No, she’ll finish out the calendar year on a low note, she already knows.

Her father sends a message around the time they make it back to the house; he’s working late, won’t be home until after Debbie goes to bed. She wants to laugh at the wording, simply because she’s grown so used to functioning on so little sleep, cannot seem to manage to fall asleep earlier than two o’clock, anyway.

Tess stays at the house with her until Danny arrives. She flits around the kitchen like she has belonged in this house forever, which she essentially has, and cooks dinner from scratch, by hand instead of by magic. When Danny gets there, he sweeps in and spreads his arms wide (“Honey, I’m home!”) and kisses her on the cheek. Then he turns to face Debbie, and there is just the slightest moment of hesitation. Debbie worries that this means the awkward tension from after the funeral is still lingering, but then he strides across the kitchen and pulls her in for a hug so secure that it feels like it’s stitching parts of her back together.

He ruffles her hair when he releases her, grinning, eyes bright. “I missed you, little sister,” he tells her grandly. “Can’t say I’m not happy to have graduated, but not being at Hogwarts is weird. Takes some real getting used to, doesn’t it?” He twists to look to Tess, who nods. Then, as if it isn’t the strangest sight Debbie has ever seen, he falls in right next to his girlfriend and starts finely chopping onions. She watches this process interestedly, the routine they have worked out in the handful of months they’ve been living together, transported directly into the kitchen of her childhood home. Danny looks up briefly, meets her eyes and smiles so a dimple appears in one cheek. “Tell me about it. How’s sixth year? What’s the new gossip? Are Lou and Daphne still gearing up to some duel that destroys the whole common room?”

Making a face, Debbie shrugs. “Probably,” she mumbles. Doesn’t want to talk about that particular rivalry, the biggest obstacle blocking her from telling Lou about Tammy. There are a hundred reasons she isn’t ready to share how she  _ feels _ about Tammy with the whole world, but Lou would understand. Lou would get it, if not for Daphne. “Sixth year is… a lot. I think I’m suffocating under all the homework. The new transfiguration teacher made me start seeing a tutor.” 

“For  _ transfiguration?” _ He freezes mid-chop with the knife, looking up disbelievingly. “Hell, Debbie, that’s been your best subject since the beginning. What happened?”

“Mum happened,” she answers. Softly, delicately. She doesn’t linger on this for long, just watches him closely enough to see the slight twitch at his lips. That’s enough to tell her he’s letting himself feel something, now. “I didn’t like the new teacher. I don’t know if I do now, either.” She crosses her arms stubbornly, raising an eyebrow, daring him to tell her that letting her grades slip so far because of one professor is childish.

He doesn’t say it, just lowers his gaze back to the cutting board. “So who’s the tutor?”

“Tammy Prescott.” She decides that she likes being able to say Tammy’s name in this house, to Danny, even if she cannot possibly feel prepared to talk about her in the capacity she wants to. This is only a little piece of it, allows her to bring Tammy into the conversation, gives her the opportunity to admit that the other girl is a part of her life in some way. It’s freeing.

“Tammy Prescott?” Danny repeats, slow and careful, like he’s testing the name out. “Like, Ravenclaw keeper? Daphne’s friend? Merlin, what would possess any staff member to have  _ her _ tutor  _ you?” _

Tess passes more vegetables to Danny, speaks up even though Debbie has half-forgotten she’s here to listen. “She’s sweet,” she shrugs. “Really smart, too.”

He’s shaking his head already. “Doesn’t matter. Debbie doesn’t like her. Fraternizing with the enemy and all that. This tutoring thing’s got to be a nightmare.”

He looks back to Debbie for confirmation. It would be easy to give it to him, but she doesn’t  _ want _ to. After the slightest taste of lightweight freedom that came with saying Tammy’s name before, she doesn’t think she wants to take a step backward again. It seems unfair. To Tammy, to herself. She’d like to have someone who she can mention Tammy to without having to check over her shoulder, even if it is someone as far away from Hogwarts as her brother. Or maybe it feels comfortable  _ because _ he’s so far away from the castle now.

Debbie shrugs, twisting the bar stool she sits on from one side to the other. “She’s not so bad, actually.”

She wishes it would come out less  _ hesitantly.  _ It sounds like she is unsure, and she’s not. Tammy is made up of all the good things she can think of, and she’s more sure about that than she has been about most things in her entire life.

She clears her throat, eyes moving up to look at Danny, to track his reaction. He’s watching her closely, eyes slightly narrowed in concentration, like he’s trying to figure out if she’s lying. “Really. She’s helped me out a lot this year already. I think we might sort of be – I don’t know. Friends.”

That feels freeing, too, referring to Tammy with some kind of title. Friends, though that doesn’t properly encompass everything she is, everything  _ they _ are. They are more than that, surely. But this is a step in the right direction.

Her brother tips his head back in a laugh, rolling his eyes to the ceiling. “And Lou hasn’t killed you for this  _ treachery  _ yet?”

She sounds too sharp when she speaks again.  _ “Don’t _ tell Lou.”

— • —

After Danny and Tess walk down to the end of the driveway to Apparate back to the heart of the city, and before her father gets home, Debbie flattens parchment across the kitchen island and writes to Tammy, right there in the open. It doesn’t count as not hiding it if she is home alone, but she pretends it does.

_ Sorry for writing so soon. It’s strange, being so far away. I sort of miss you, even if it’s only been a day.  _

This is revealing too much; she should start over. She doesn’t, though. If they were up at the top of their tower right now, she wouldn’t be able to take words back once they were out. So she leaves the sentences on the page just as they are, dives forward to tell Tammy about her day, asks how things are going at her mum’s friend’s house. It’s not a long letter, not enough material to cover to give it much substance, and she feels a little ridiculous, sending it anyway.

After Lilith disappears from view, she goes upstairs. Hesitates in the doorway of her parents’ room, winds up stepping in to breathe in the air there. It doesn’t smell like her mother anymore.

She finds what’s left of her mother’s things in boxes in the attic. There doesn’t seem to be enough of it; she wonders whether this is the important things her father can’t make himself get rid of, or just the leftovers he hasn’t gotten around to dealing with yet. Sitting cross-legged on the floor, Debbie sorts through the boxes one by one to find the things she wants to keep. After she closes up the last box again, she piles them high in her arms and carries them back down to her bedroom, stashing them away out of sight and feeling only marginally bad about it. There is that possibility, however uncertain, that these are things her father wants to keep – but she knows that if she comes back at Easter and these things are gone, she’ll regret it. So she hangs another necklace from a hook next to her mirror, folds a few sweaters and a scarf in amongst her own clothes, lines up a pair of high heels in her closet that she will never wear. There are a handful of books, too, which she adds to her shelves with the others she collected over the summer. She has already read all the ones she brought to school, and carefully switches them out in her trunk with new ones now, so she doesn’t forget.

She doesn’t sleep well, but it doesn’t matter – she is used to it. It’s early when she shuffles into the kitchen, and her father has not left for work yet. He pours her a mug full of coffee and stays on the other side of the island when he passes it to her, as if he doesn’t know how to be any closer to her. The feeling is mutual. “Deborah,” he greets her, and unfolds his newspaper. And that’s it.

They used to talk more, before the endless tragedy of last summer. Maybe she looks too much like her mother for it not to hurt when he looks at her. Maybe this is their new normal.

Two days before Christmas, she asks if she can go with him into London. Their house is the kind of large building with sweeping gardens that fits best even farther out than the actual outskirts of the city. “Christmas shopping,” she says when he asks. “I’m meeting a friend in Diagon Alley.” 

This is a lie; she spends the day wandering the storefronts alone. She finds a gift for Tammy in one, a delicate bracelet made of a twisted silver chain, doesn’t know exactly what it is about the jewelry that draws her to it, but has it carefully placed in a soft velvet-coloured box, anyway. It’s not until after she has already paid that she thinks more than fleetingly about this. That they have definitely not talked about the concept of gift-giving, that Tammy’s mum is still getting settled at a new job and she doesn’t have any income of her own. It doesn’t matter, she thinks as she slides the box into her coat pocket. She doesn’t need anything in return; she just thought of Tammy when she spotted it, wants to see it clasped around the blonde’s wrist, would like its existence to make her smile.

She runs straight into someone when she turns around to leave the store, wavers trying to catch her balance back before there are hands at her shoulders to steady her. Professor Longbottom releases her once she’s standing properly upright again. “Shit,” she says. “I mean, I’m sorry. Are you – what are you doing here?”

He smiles. “Oh, just some last-minute Christmas shopping. I’m looking for something for my wife.”

“Me, too,” mumbles Debbie. “The Christmas shopping, I mean, not the – you know.” She typically manages to appear for more put-together, but if the herbology teacher is thrown off by the way she’s finding it difficult to string words together today, he doesn’t say anything. He looks curious, though, in that bright-eyed way he sometimes does, and for the smallest of moments, she can see his attention flicker down. Down to where her fingers are tight around the box deep in her pocket, Tammy’s bracelet hidden away. Did he see it with any clarity, before? When did he come into the store?

But he doesn’t say anything about the bracelet, and she can’t find the words to describe the wave of gratitude and relief that sweeps over her from head to toe. “I hope you find what you’re looking for,” is all he says, and searches her eyes briefly before nodding, as if that confirms something for him. “Happy Christmas, Debbie. I’ll see you in January.”

She meets her father in the Leaky Cauldron after he finishes work, holds onto his elbow with one hand and Tammy’s gift in her pocket with the other as they Apparate back to the end of their driveway. Upstairs, she wraps the small velvet box in a T-shirt for safekeeping and stashes it deep in one corner of her trunk.

Tammy’s letter back arrives the next day, Christmas Eve, in the early afternoon. She has been sleeping with her window open for Lilith, even with the light blanket of snow dusted over everything she can see. The letter is tied carefully to the owl’s leg with a red ribbon, the kind people tie around presents at this time of year. Debbie shuts her bedroom door and sits on the floor with her back pressed against it, unfolding the letter like the thin Muggle paper is fragile, too precious to rip. She drinks in every word, reads the whole thing three times over, committing phrases to memory.

Later, with Tammy’s letter added to the drawer with the old address and the reply from the summer, Debbie curls into an armchair downstairs to write back.

“Who are you writing to?” her brother asks, lounging on the couch with his legs hanging over the armrest. Tess is with her parents; their father is working late, again, even tonight. They are parentless, here, fire crackling away to fill up the silence left where their mother used to be.

_ Lou,  _ she could lie through her teeth, and he would believe her. But it’s just them, and she doesn’t know how she can handle lying to all of her friends at school  _ and  _ her brother here, when all the corners of her mind are already filled up with guilt. 

So she dips her quill back into the ink on the end table next to her and answers, as nonchalantly as she can manage, “Tammy.”

It feels freeing again for about half a second before this registers, and Danny sits up abruptly. “Shit, seriously? You really are friends, then, huh?” She nods, heart beating too fast, and makes a dark ink blot where she doesn’t mean to. Danny eyes her interestedly. “What are you even writing to her about?”

She folds the parchment over to hide the words, even though he’s still halfway across the room. “Just stuff,” she says vaguely. That’s not going to be enough to appease him, she knows, so she stops writing to level her gaze at him. “I guess we’ve got some things in common that we didn’t realize until we actually talked to each other. She’s a really good listener. I think I can talk to her about a lot of things.”

They lapse back into silence after that, until Debbie moves to the window to release Lilith and her letter back. She doesn’t return to the armchair, but lies on her back on the floor between the fireplace and the Christmas tree she and Danny decorated that morning. Her father pulled the boxes downstairs before he went to work, apologizing briefly for not being able to decorate with them. He has wavered in and out of Christmas traditions since Debbie was very young, has only consistently been a part of their actual Christmas mornings. Their mother was always the one who guided them through that part of the holidays. Perhaps a little foolishly, she thought maybe he would be more involved now, for the first Christmas without her.

She stretches her leg out to nudge Danny’s knees with one foot. “Come here,” she insists, however reluctant he seems. “Please? We can’t miss this step. It’s the best part.”

“Maybe when I was eight,” he grumbles, but he waves his wand to illuminate the strings of lights amongst the branches, and maneuvers himself down into the floor next to her. “Ready?”

Debbie nods, dark hair whispering over the carpet. She pushes her feet into the floor to slide herself up, and Danny does the same thing next to her. Their mother used to lie in between them, with this soft look on her face that she didn’t get anywhere else.  _ I used to do this when I was little, _ she explained, every year. They would stay there long enough that time seemed meaningless, looking up at the decorated tree from an angle nobody ever thought to look from.  _ It’s so beautiful from down here, _ she would say.

“Hey, Danny?” She trains her gaze up when she speaks. One of the lights is half-hidden behind the spot where a branch splits into two, and it looks like a fairy’s home.

“Yeah?”

“Do you talk about Mum?” She can see and sort of feel, rather than see, the way her brother turns his head to look at her. The question is abrupt, and comes on a day they’ve spent navigating the things Caroline Ocean used to be a part of without really acknowledging the missing piece. “I think you should. To someone. It doesn’t have to be me. Maybe Tess. It doesn’t make it not real or anything. It’s just good to do, you know? So it’s not all stuck in your head.”

He’s quiet, and she thinks maybe this isn’t the right time. All she can think about is how nothing in his face moved when he got to St Mungo’s too late to say goodbye. How she went hollow and didn’t speak, and how things feel more manageable, more okay, when she can put words to things about her mother. How she’s worried that Danny is going to forget the stories if he doesn’t let himself tell them.

Danny looks back up again, and the moment is gone – feels impossibly out of reach in a way that makes the air deflate right out of her lungs. But he sighs, a long exhale until all his oxygen is gone, too, and then asks, “When did you get so smart?”

“I’ve always been smart,” she teases him. It’s not the right time for a joke, and it falls flat, comes out too seriously. She moves on like it never happened, eyes fixed on the decorations. Her mother’s favourite is a little birdhouse with snow on top and a tiny red bird. Debbie felt strange, hanging it herself this year, but it would have been even stranger to skip the birdhouse altogether. “I’ve been talking to Tammy a lot. Her dad died in third year. She likes to hear stories about Mum, and then she tells them about him. She says it’s important.”

Her brother gives a low whistle. “Damn. I hope Lou doesn’t actually kill you,” he says, in just that perfectly-detached way that the Oceans seem to have ingrained into their veins. “Being friends with Tammy Prescott might actually be really good for you.” He’s quiet again then, and Debbie is just about to resignedly accept that he’s still not ready to talk when he says, very faintly, “I don’t think I know how to talk about her.”

This is the first time in her life that she can remember her older brother admitting an inability to do something, anything at all. She takes a moment to acknowledge this, to wonder if there are others, too. “I know. I didn’t, either.”  _ I still don’t, most of the time. _ She plucks a pine needle off the lowest tree branch and rolls it between her thumb and index finger. “You can start really small.”

Another sigh; he takes in as much air as he can hold and then lets it go slowly, bit by bit. Then he stays like that, with no air in his chest at all, for a moment where Debbie can hear her heartbeat in her ears. “I miss her,” he says finally.

It’s only three words, but it’s something. She’ll take it.

Debbie drops the pine needle to the floor and reaches for his hand without looking. She thinks she hasn’t held her brother’s hand since she was very young, young enough that she had to hold onto someone when she crossed the street. She squeezes his hand lightly, like he needs the pressure to remind him she’s there, and he squeezes back. “I miss her, too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm sorry for the absolute lack of debtam content in this chapter! but debbie's come a long way since the summer and, honestly, it's because of actual angel tammy prescott. who we'll be seeing with next chapter, when she finally gets to be near her mother again... and how will _that_ go?
> 
> i'd love to read your comments, if you have words in your brain for them! you can also yell at me on twitter if you want to follow @deboceans there, or even stick to anonymous yelling if you follow the link on my profile there to curious cat. as we all know, i need attention to function. i'm like tinker bell in that way.
> 
> thank you for reading!


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> an owl swoops out of the sky midway through breakfast and taps at the living room window, and nadine looks like she's ready to kill someone. maybe the owl, maybe tammy herself. the owl is debbie's, all smooth black feathers and a letter tied to her leg; tammy's heart leaps, just for a moment, before she remembers just how thoroughly her mother's best friend is not going to like anything about this. "excuse me," she mumbles, abandoning her coffee. upstairs, she throws the window open and leans out, waving her arm to get lilith's attention. the owl tilts her head curiously, and it takes a treat to coax her up.
> 
> tammy sits cross-legged on the edge of her mattress to read it. she feels bad for shutting lilith and storm up in the same cage – it’s not too tight of a squeeze, but she is sure they would both appreciate having a little more space. but leaving lilith free to roam the room and make a mess is out of the question. not in nadine’s house.

Stepping back into Nadine’s house feels just as empty as it did in the summer. Tammy floats around the place, uncertain, hardly touching anything and feeling thoroughly as if she does not belong here. The woman’s husband smiles tightly at her in the kitchen over a glass of water. “How’s this term been?” he asks conversationally, and she appreciates the effort, but he doesn’t want a real answer. She tells him it’s been good, and that’s enough.

“Oliver, can you run to the store? We’re nearly out of milk,” says Nadine, bursting into the room like she’s afraid Tammy will cast some sort of spell on him if she gets too much face time. Maybe she didn’t seem to like Tammy all that much before they had to tell her about magic, but now is a hundred times worse. Tammy feels a sinking feeling tugging around her heart.

Christmas break is going to be  _ far _ too long. It is going to feel like an eternity of isolation, she knows already. Her mum has booked a week and a half off work, but there are three days until then. She managed to get a late start approved today, picked Tammy up at King’s across and dropped her off at the house, kissing her on the cheek before disappearing down the street. Tammy’s grateful for that, at least – can’t imagine the horrible awkward tension that would have risen into the air if Nadine had been talked into going – but there was a hesitant quality to the oxygen on the drive back here, and she doesn’t want to think about what it will be like if that feeling sticks. Of course, since she doesn’t want to think about it, that is the only train of thought spiralling around in her head. What if they’ve reached the point of no return for all the things altering her relationship with her mum? What if this is  _ it? _

She feigns being too tired for dinner, carefully stretches the bed sheets over the pull-out in her mother’s room instead. It’s not really a lie – she  _ is _ tired, and ends up falling asleep without really thinking about it. Maybe that’s all she’ll do over Christmas, catch up on all the sleep she’s been losing out on in favour of spending time with Debbie.

Her mother wakes her when she gets back from work later, a light touch on the shoulder and a smile on the dimly-lit room. She nudges Tammy over to make space for her, ignoring her own bed to slip her arm around Tammy’s shoulders, chin resting on her head. “I missed you so much,” she sighs. It’s late enough that the house has gone quiet around her, though Tammy can see light falling from other windows into the backyard and knows that the rest of the house’s residents aren’t asleep yet.

“I missed you, too, Mum,” she whispers back. And they talk like that, in low voices, until all the lights have blinked off.  Every word makes her feel a little more secure, safe, proving to her that there’s nothing that can  _ really _ get in between her and her mother. In the dark, Tammy lets a moment of comfortable silence drag out until she builds up the courage to say, very carefully, “I wish we’d gotten to write to each other more.”

Her mum smiles sadly. The way she’s holding Tammy, she can’t see it, but she can hear it clearly enough in her tone of voice when she speaks again. “Me, too, baby. I’m sorry about that. I’ve been so busy with the job and everything, trying to turn things around for us. I love you, though. You know that, right?”

Tammy nods, a difficult movement with the way they’re sitting. “I’ve got a lot to catch you up on,” she admits. “Tomorrow, though. You should probably get some sleep.”

Before her mum gets up to move into her own bed, she pulls away just far enough to look Tammy in the eyes and smiles. “Tomorrow,” she promises. “Good night, honey.”

Tomorrow, though, turns out to go differently. Perhaps the nighttime conversation with her mother has made some holes in Tammy’s guards, because she’s simply not  _ ready _ when it comes to breakfast the next morning. It turns out that her mum has been integrated smoothly into an entire breakfast routine – Oliver makes coffee for everyone and she adds the milk and sugar, and Miriam occupies her with a long-winded story. Michael catches Tammy’s eye when she appears in the doorway and asks, rather nicely, she thinks, if she wants coffee.

“She doesn’t drink coffee,” her mum answers over her shoulder, distracted by Miriam in a way that Tammy can only describe as  _ comfortable.  _ Like this is how breakfast goes every day. It’s a little jarring, to see her mother pulled into another family’s orbit this way. It reminds her that she is gone for nearly ten months of every year, that she doesn’t fit here in that way.

Tammy straightens her shoulders and raises her chin slightly. “Yeah, I’ll have some coffee,” she tells Michael, feeling her mother’s attention divert from the younger girl to watch her as she takes a cup from him. She adds sugar, business-like – she’s managed to experiment with that enough to find the exact right amount that she likes, by this point.

“Since when do you drink coffee?” asks her mother. There are not enough seats at the kitchen table, and so Tammy leans her elbows on the counter purposefully, as if she doesn’t want to sit down, anyway.

She shrugs and takes her first sip. She still doesn’t  _ like _ coffee much, truthfully, but the sugar makes it better; Rose was right, of course. And it’s been necessary, considering how little sleep she’s been running on and how much time she’s been spending at the top of the astronomy tower. “I don’t know. A while?”

An owl swoops out of the sky midway through breakfast and taps at the living room window, and Nadine looks like she’s ready to kill someone. Maybe the owl, maybe Tammy herself. The owl is Debbie’s, recognizable from last summer, all smooth black feathers and a letter tied to her leg. Tammy’s heart leaps, just for a moment, before she remembers just how thoroughly her mother’s best friend is  _ not _ going to like anything about this. “Excuse me,” she mumbles, abandoning her coffee and pretending there aren’t several pairs of eyes focused on her. Upstairs, she throws the window open in her mother’s bedroom and leans out, waving her arm to get Lilith’s attention. “Up here,” she hisses, scanning the neighbouring backyards. There is nobody else to witness this; Nadine can be grateful for that, at least. The owl tilts her head curiously, and it takes a treat held between two fingers out the window to coax her up.

Debbie’s letter is short; it hasn’t been long enough for anything else. Still, Tammy sits cross-legged on the edge of her mattress to read it.  _ It’s strange, being so far away. I sort of miss you, _ the other girl has written. The ink is a little smudged from the speed with which she appears to have put the words to parchment. 

She feels bad for shutting Lilith and Storm up in the same cage – it’s not  _ too  _ tight of a squeeze, but she is sure they would both appreciate having a little more space. But leaving Lilith free to roam the room and make a mess is out of the question. Not in Nadine’s house.

After her mother and Oliver have left for work, packing Michael and the girls into their respective vehicles to drop them off at various friends’ houses, the atmosphere in the house grows darker, colder. Nadine puts laundry in and very stiffly asks Tammy if she has anything that needs washing, and those are the only words she speaks to Tammy all morning. Around lunchtime, she announces that she’s made grilled cheese sandwiches; Tammy makes her way to the kitchen because all she’s had today is half a cup of coffee, but Nadine hasn’t stuck around to eat with her. She doesn’t mind this, really – has no idea what kind of small talk she could manage to make with this woman, anyway. She washes her plate in the sink afterward, dries it, and replaces it in the cupboard, trying to make the place look exactly as it would if she wasn’t here at all.

The air in the house is suffocating, and the time is crawling by too slowly. She finds Nadine in the laundry room as she pulls her coat on. “I’m going to go for a walk,” Tammy tells her, wondering if she should phrase it like a question. Nadine isn’t her mother, not by a long shot, but maybe she’d like to be asked for permission.

It doesn’t matter, though, because all Nadine does is nod absently and flutter her fingers in a wave. “Have fun,” she intones. “Dinner is at seven.”

They are only a ten-minute drive from their old house, which turns into a much higher number when translated into walking. Still, Tammy takes a winding route through the suburbs until she finds the house. There is a new car parked in the driveway and Christmas lights strung up over the entire first floor’s roofline. The new owners have skipped the second floor altogether; Tammy’s dad never did, always managed to get a ladder up that high even as her mum worried about him doing it. As a firefighter, the heights didn’t scare him much. He was always sort of fearless.

She gets back to the house just after seven, and they have already started eating. Someone has pulled a folding lawn chair out of the garage and placed it at the corner of the table, so there is somewhere for her to sit. She doesn’t join in on the conversation, doesn’t really have anything to add, anyway. They want to play a card game after dinner, to which her mother eagerly agrees. Mara spreads the cards out over the table while her siblings clear the dishes, and Tammy presses her back against the wall next to the door so she will not be in the way. She doesn’t know the card game and doesn’t have the energy to learn it, so she slips upstairs without saying anything, and nobody tries to call her back.

It has only been a day and a half since she got back into London, and it feels like an eternity.

_ Things with my mum are kind of weird, _ she writes back to Debbie. Distantly, through the closed door and down the stairs, she can hear her mother’s laughter intertwining with everyone else’s.  _ It’s like she’s got this whole other life now, and it’s one I don’t really fit into. It was really nice last night and we talked a lot, but it feels like all the distance from me being away for school is still there, even if I’m this close to her. _

She sends Lilith back with the letter very early the next morning, releasing the owl from the window around the time she normally crawls back into her bed in Ravenclaw Tower. Nadine won’t want her to do that in the middle of the day, she’s sure, will be too afraid of her neighbours seeing an owl soar out of one of the upstairs bedrooms. Tammy crawls back into bed and listens to her mother’s even breathing across the room until she drifts off.

It’s Christmas Eve now, and Tammy spends the first half of the day walking on tiptoe around the house and trying not to get in the way of their hosts’ holiday traditions. Her mum gets involved in all of them, which is to be expected, considering how seamlessly she fits in with them. Nothing is done in the way, or the order, that it has been done for Tammy’s entire life, and it fills her with a feeling reminiscent of paralysis. Everything has changed, and it seems as if she’s lost the connection that she and her mum have always had, and this will be the first of endless Christmases without even the house that her dad used to decorate.

Really, this is okay. Losing those old traditions is something that she can live with. All except one. They used to all pile into the car on Christmas Eve after the sun went down, get takeout for dinner and eat it as they drove, slow and steady, along every street they could find to look at all the Christmas lights. They started to do this when Tammy was very small, too small to retain much. Early enough in her life that it’s been a fuzzy memory all along, something that has just  _ always _ been, no matter what. Tammy’s favourites used to be all the bright colours, the greens and reds and purples and blues, but a couple years before her father died, she started to gain more appreciation for the ones decorated to look more classy. Soft whites and icicle lights, sparkling into the night. Her dad would drive, and her mum would twist around in the passenger seat with the brightest smile on her face, and they have only ever missed one year: That first Christmas without him.

The next year, Tammy’s mother tugged her out into the car and Tammy went only reluctantly. It was difficult at first, felt wrong without him, with her mum in the driver’s seat and Tammy in the front now. But as they turned onto the most brightly-lit street of them all, her mum pointed over the steering wheel at one house and said, “That one would be your dad’s first place of the year.” And she was right, it  _ would _ have been.

She doesn’t want to miss another year of that. Not now, when it feels like the loss would be permanent instead of temporary.

Nadine and Oliver take the kids to church on Christmas Eve. They have been mentioning this on and off all day, and Tammy has mostly resigned herself to the idea that she and her mother will be tagging along. It’s not something she’s going to be able to get out of, not while she’s living under this roof. She dresses nicely – people do that for church, right? – and braids her hair, climbs into the passenger seat while her mum runs around to find her keys. They can’t all fit in Nadine’s SUV, and Tammy has never felt so thankful for anything in her life, she thinks.

When her mother appears, she’s wearing jeans and a red sweater under her coat. “You look nice,” she says as she turns the key in the ignition. 

Tammy watches as she backs out of the driveway, moving the gear shift from reverse to drive like it’s second nature. She’s old enough to learn to drive, but there doesn’t seem to be much of a point, when she’s at Hogwarts for such a great portion of each year. Maybe after she graduates. “Can you wear jeans in church?” she asks. Christmas carols play quietly from the car’s speakers, and her mum’s fingers are tapping the rhythm against the steering wheel.

Her mum glances at her swiftly, curiously. “I thought maybe we wouldn’t go,” she says after a moment. “We could go look at the lights, instead. Unless you… unless you want to go?”

“No,” Tammy answers quickly, wondering just how evident the relief in her voice is. There’s something in her mum’s eyes before she looks back to the road that says it’s noticeable, at the very least. “No, let’s go look at the lights. I’d like that.”

That gets a smile, and it feels like things are starting to go back to normal again. Tammy wonders if every day until she goes back to Hogwarts will be like this: A rollercoaster, a good day giving way to a bad one and then back again. She wonders how long they’re really going to be staying with Nadine, how long  _ temporary _ actually is. “Okay,” says her mother, and turns right onto the main road when Nadine’s SUV turns left.

As always, they choose the top houses from all the ones they’ve seen. Three for Tammy, three for her mum, three for her dad. Once, before he died, they tried to pit the three winners against each other to pick the ultimate first place, but it turned out that was mostly impossible. Everyone felt far too strongly that theirs was the best, and the vote wound up in a three-way tie. After that, they stuck to the original system.

“I’m sorry we didn’t get to talk much yesterday,” says her mother, forty minutes in. “I know you said you have things to catch me up on. Too much to write?”

“I didn’t want to write big long letters when you were so busy,” Tammy mumbles, smoothing out her skirt. It’s black and soft and high-waisted, and she’s tucked a long-sleeved dark green top into it, and it’s not particularly fancy, but the usual clothes she wears under her robes at school are jeans, so she feels perhaps a little out of place this way. It’s a good thing she’s not at Nadine’s church, where she would feel like every pair of eyes were pointed at her, even if they weren’t.

Her mum keeps one hand on the wheel and reaches over with the other to catch Tammy’s hand. “I might be busy and not always able to write long letters back, but that doesn’t mean I want to have to play catch-up on holidays,” she says, very seriously. Tammy digs her teeth into the inside of her lower lip guiltily. “Anything you want to tell me, anytime, I’m going to read it. I promise.” She leaves a long pause to allow this to settle in, and then replaces that hand on the steering wheel and continues, “So, catch me up. What have I missed?”

She starts small, tells her mum about her classes this year. How they’re so much harder than anything else before, how much homework she has, how there’s a new transfiguration professor and it’s been a little confusing to adjust to a new teaching style. Then she delves into other topics – the Quidditch games she didn’t write about, and Daphne introducing her to coffee, and how gratifying it feels every time one of the kids she’s tutoring pulls off a better grade. It feels good to talk to her mother about everything, to feel like she doesn’t need to hold back on the details.

She’s building up to telling her mum about Debbie. Slowly but surely. The words don’t come until they’ve looped around and are weaving their way back towards the house. “So, um,” she stutters a little through the beginning. “I sort of, um. Met someone, I guess. A girl. I met a girl.”

They are pulled over parallel with the nearest sidewalk a moment later, and her mother throws the car into park and turns the radio dial down until it clicks off, all in one fluid movement, ending with her whole body turned in her seat to look at Tammy. “You met a girl,” she says, in this hushed, awed sort of tone that brings a smile bubbling up inside her. Tammy tries to keep that under control, though she doesn’t think she does a very good job of it. “I can’t believe you didn’t  _ start _ with that. Tell me everything.”

And so Tammy tells her everything, or at least a lot of things. More than she told Amita, easily. “Her name is Debbie,” she begins, and there is this overwhelming swell of happiness at being able to say her name so easily here. She explains how they’ve known each other forever but never really talked, how Daphne and Lou don’t get along, how there are no real labels and how it’s complicated and how they don’t really get to spend much time together. Her mother gets that same concerned look in her eye that Amita did, but she shuts it down as quickly as she can, reassures her that it’s not a problem. That they’ll get to that point, though she has no idea when, or whether or not that’s actually true. She talks about Debbie’s mother and about tutoring and about how she thinks she can tell Debbie anything, and her eyes light up the whole time.

“Debbie,” her mother echoes, smiling in a soft reflection of Tammy’s own expression. And yes, Tammy thinks it’s good, that she’s shared this part of her life right now. She didn’t want to do it through a letter, but this feels like a good moment for it. “Was that her owl, hanging out with Storm?”

Her cheeks feel warm, are maybe a little pink. “Yes,” she admits, playing with the hem of her skirt just for something to do with her fingers. She looks at all the Christmas lights lining the houses closest to them. The people in the house they’re parked in front of have twisted strands of lights all around the trunk and branches of the trees bordering the entrance to their front path. Nervously, Tammy looks back to her mum, takes in the way the lights reflect in her eyes. “I think I’m falling for her, Mum. Like, really falling.”

— • —

It’s one thing telling someone who’s  _ not _ Debbie that, but she thinks telling Debbie is something very far away. There is a distinct possibility that saying that out loud, even without  _ the _ word itself, will simply scare Debbie off. Still, speaking about the depth of her feelings for the other girl to  _ someone _ has made Tammy feel light and airy, put a little bit of a bounce in her step that even Nadine and her family’s attitudes towards her cannot steal away. Maybe they have claimed all of her mum’s daily routines and adjusted them to match their own, but the closing half of winter break does cement it into Tammy’s mind that she still  _ has _ her mother, no matter what.

Embarrassingly, her mother makes her point Debbie out to her at King’s Cross, even going so far as to mime an actual cross over her heart as she promises not to say anything to anyone at all. “I just want to see what she looks like,” she sighs, allowing a hint of a whine into her voice as if  _ she’s _ the child in this situation.

And so when they get inside, Tammy finds the opportune moment when Debbie is deep in conversation with Lou twenty feet away to lean in close so she can hiss in her mum’s ear, “Don’t be obvious. Two o’clock, the one with the dark hair.”

To her credit, her mum is incredibly subtle in the way that she looks, gaze traveling smoothly to Debbie and her friends, face perfectly impassive until she turns back. “So you weren’t exaggerating about how pretty she is,” she says, carefully keeping her voice down. She’s making a big effort for Tammy here, and Tammy can’t even find the words to tell her how much that means to her. This can be added to the list of a million reasons why she’s absolutely certain that her mum is one of the best ones around.

Tammy curls her arms tight around her mother’s shoulders before she gets on the train, packing the next few months’ worth of hugs into a singular massive one. “I’m going to miss you,” she whispers fiercely. “I’ll write you a really, really long letter in a couple days, I promise.” There have been reparations to the disconnect she’s felt from her mother since going back to school in September, and the letters are not going to be a problem, she doesn’t  _ think. _ Still, there is one topic they haven’t talked about, which is probably the one with the power to dismantle all the work they’ve put in over the holidays: Nadine and her family and their house, the puzzle with too many pieces in which Tammy is the only one who doesn’t slot neatly in.

That is a problem to deal with later on, though. Or perhaps to never deal with at all.  _ Just until we get back on our feet, _ that’s what her mum said when they left the old house behind. And there’s a job now, a savings account filling up towards a new place to live. A place that will be all their own. Tammy doesn’t want to get her hopes up for Easter, doesn’t want to get attached to an unrealistic timeline, but she tries to remind herself that the current situation is a temporary one.

She spends the train ride back to Hogwarts catching up with her friends, sharing little snippets and stories about their holidays. John Frazier raps his knuckles on the compartment door halfway through the trip and asks her and Amita to take a patrol shift, and she catches a glimpse of Debbie and resists the urge to simply stalk up and down that train car to see more of her. She’ll see Debbie tonight, and it feels impossibly far away, but she’s been counting down the time for days now.

It feels a little more dangerous to sneak out the the tower tonight, because she is bringing something with her, and it is something that cannot be easily explained away as prefect duties. She has placed Debbie’s gift in a box and wrapped it carefully with Christmas tree wrapping paper leftover from Nadine’s house, and has covered that up to the best of her ability to smuggle it to the astronomy tower, winding a deep blue scarf around and around it. It’s not the best disguise – it still looks rather like a box, after all – but it makes her feel just slightly more secure until she makes it to the top of the stairs.

Debbie isn’t there yet, but this fact no longer brings with it a profound sense of worry. In the early fall, the lack of the Gryffindor girl would have led Tammy’s mind to spin into overdrive; tonight, she simply sits down at the edge as usual, by the railing, and sets the gift next to her on the side Debbie never picks, and waits. She doesn’t have to wait long tonight, and scrambles up to stand when she hears light footsteps on the stairs. She has barely made it to her feet and Debbie is already rushing for her, drawing her in close for a kiss like she ran out of air in the past three weeks and Tammy is the oxygen she craves.

“I missed this,” Tammy whispers when the kiss breaks, weaving her fingers into Debbie’s dark hair to keep her close. “I missed you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> god, they're finally back together again! this chapter and the last one were rough for me to write because i just wanted cute fluffy things and they were so far apart and i haaated it. if you've got comments or kudos to give, i'll love you forever! gonna drop my twitter again because why not? it's @deboceans and i'm always ready to be yelled at there.


	13. Chapter 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> she isn’t sure at what point, exactly, she became so attached to tammy. it seems to have happened without her explicit permission – slowly, just gradually enough to not be quite as noticeable. being all the way across a city from her for three whole weeks without even the barest possibility of seeing her was a little bit of a wake-up call, though. and now that they’re both back at hogwarts, she finds that sitting with tammy at the top of their tower is one of those things she needs in order to function. missing a night with tammy makes it difficult to focus on anything else for the entirety of the following day, and she didn’t realize this before christmas. the tower still isn’t an every single night sort of thing, but debbie can trace the way her mood drops in steep landslides on the days after she’s spent the whole night in gryffindor tower.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aaannnddd we're back to our regularly scheduled programming! by which i mean, debbie and tammy actually being close to each other instead of stuck in their separate sadness for all of christmas break. writing the holidays is so rough because i'm just??? sad??? i want them to be together again??? anyway, there's lots of debtam content to make up for it this chapter, i promise.

Every cell in Debbie’s body feels like it’s being tugged in the direction of the astronomy tower, and Constance is taking too long to fall asleep. The girl lies on her side, head propped up on her hand, whispering a story about the excessive number of pranks her cousins played on New Year’s Eve. Constance always tells stories in a long, winding way that involves going off on unrelated tangents before remembering  _ exactly _ how far into the plot she was and bringing it back, so it takes what feels like hours before reaching the end. Debbie feels a little bad for the grateful relaxation in her bones as her friend’s blinks start to grow longer, eyelids heavy, until Constance finally drifts off. She waits until the other girl’s breathing evens out into light snores, then slides out of bed and slips her shoes on.

She reaches the top of the astronomy tower in what seems like record time, and Tammy is already there. Debbie crosses over to her like she’s in a trance, muscles moving automatically to tug the blonde towards her, hand curving around to the back of her neck. Three weeks, she thinks, is far too long to go without kissing Tammy Prescott, and all she wants to do is get as close as possible, to make up for all the lost time. Unfortunately, her lungs run out of air before she can get nearly enough, and she has to pull back. Tammy doesn’t let her get far, twisting her fingers loosely into Debbie’s hair to hold her in place.  _ I missed this, _ she says.  _ I missed you. _

Smiling a tiny, mischievous smile, Debbie lets her fingers skate down over Tammy’s sides to her hips. “I missed you, too. Even with the letters,” she admits. She presses her lips to Tammy’s again, this time soft and slow and careful. “I got you something. And before you say it, I don’t need something in return or anything. I know we didn’t talk about it, I just – I saw it and I thought of you.”

She’s fighting back a smile, Debbie can tell. She likes when she can draw that out, likes the way it makes Tammy’s eyes sparkle and the way she shakes her head just slightly as she does it, like she can’t believe it’s happening. “I-it’s okay. I sort of brought you something, too,” she sighs, the grin winning out.

They sit down facing each other, cross-legged with her knees touching Tammy’s. She watches the blonde reach for a package wrapped in a Ravenclaw scarf, hand it over nervously. She frees it from that and finds another layer underneath, proper wrapping paper this time. With extreme precision, Debbie unwraps that, careful not to rip the paper. 

“It’s not a lot,” says Tammy awkwardly, twisting her fingers together as she watches every one of Debbie’s movements. Inside the box is a sweater, soft and brown with big buttons, folded neatly. She lifts it up carefully so it falls out of the folds. “It’s, um, from a thrift store my mum and I found, so it’s not new or anything. I washed it twice, though. I… just thought it looked like something you’d like to wear.” She looks at Tammy to find that her cheeks have gone pink, coloured enough to be noticeable even in this light, and her words are falling all over themselves trying to get out too quickly. “You don’t have to keep it. It was just kind of –”

Debbie shrugs the sweater she’s wearing off her shoulders and lets it fall to the floor. It’s January and too cold for the thin tank top she’s wearing underneath, but she only stays like that for a moment before pulling the new-old sweater on instead. It’s got that feeling of having been worn a lot of times before, and there are loose threads at the hems of each sleeve, but it’s  _ nice.  _ Another article of clothing with a memory of Tammy stitched into it, she thinks. 

She places her hand softly on Tammy’s knee and waits until she cuts herself off mid-sentence. “I like it,” she says, clear and firm. And she  _ does.  _ It’s not about where it came from or how many times it’s been washed since its last owner wore it. It’s about the thought of Tammy and her mother in a thrift store, the kind which Debbie has never set foot in, finding something that reminded her of  _ Debbie. _

It’s Tammy’s turn next, and her lips form a small, round  _ O _ when she opens up the smooth velvet-coated box and sees the bracelet. Debbie has been opening the box up every night to look at it, resisting the urge to trail her fingers over the spiralling silver of it, and it feels like her heart is rising up in her chest as she watches Tammy take it in. Wide-eyed, the other girl looks up over the bracelet to her and mumbles, “This is – this is way too much. Debbie, I can’t take this.”

“Why not?”

“I… That sweater only cost three pounds,” points out Tammy. Her fingers are tight on the edges of the box, even as she holds it back out in Debbie’s direction. “ _ This _ must have cost a lot.”

She wants Debbie to take it back, and Debbie feels a twinge of disappointment at this for a few seconds before shoving it down and giving way to stubbornness instead. “Technically, it was my father’s money, anyway. He won’t miss it,” she says, fingertips pressing on the closest side of the box to apply pressure back. “I told you, I don’t even want anything back. I love the three-pound sweater, because it’s from you. And I saw this and I thought about you wearing it and I wanted you to have it. I  _ want _ you to have it.”

And maybe Tammy looks a little bit reluctant as she allows the bracelet to be clasped around her left wrist, but Debbie can see it peeking out from under her robes every day for the next week. She quickly develops a habit of reaching for it absentmindedly, tracing her fingers over it during class while she thinks. Debbie, for her part, wears the sweater three days in a row. It’s something that makes her feel, strangely, as if she is close to Tammy even when she can’t get near her in most parts of the castle.

“Is that new?” asks Lou, frowning when she shows up to breakfast wearing it the next morning. “I’ve never seen that one before.”

“Oh, this? I’ve had it for a while,” she answers airily. Another little white lie, and one that Lou can undoubtedly pick up on. The list of them just keeps growing. She does her very best not to focus on it. “Can you pass the orange juice?”

She isn’t sure at what point, exactly, she became so  _ attached _ to Tammy. It seems to have happened without her explicit permission – slowly, just gradually enough to not be quite as noticeable. Being all the way across a city from her for three whole weeks without even the barest possibility of seeing her was a little bit of a wake-up call, though. And now that they’re both back at Hogwarts, she finds that sitting with Tammy at the top of their tower is one of those things she needs in order to function. Missing a night with Tammy makes it difficult to focus on anything else for the entirety of the following day, and she didn’t realize this before Christmas. The tower still isn’t an every single night sort of thing, but Debbie can trace the way her mood drops in steep landslides on the days after she’s spent the whole night in Gryffindor Tower.

It’s terrifying, mostly, everything about it. Debbie is not accustomed to opening herself up to someone in this way. The Oceans are closed off by nature, and it is something she’s learned from early on. Letting people in shows a sort of weakness and vulnerability that makes her feel unsteady, as if she could lose her balance at any moment and fall. Maybe Tammy has been slowly working her way in past Debbie’s guards for months now, but sometimes it hits her a little harder, reminds her that she’s exposing all these different parts of her and that she’s going to get hurt. That’s just what happens, right? She never did this with Claude. That’s what made it so easy to leave him, in the end. With Tammy, though, there is a deeper-running connection, etching itself into all of Debbie’s insides like a river slowly carving its path out.

So there are a million reasons to run, to end it all before anything can actually go wrong, to save herself the pain she’s pretty sure is on some distant horizon. But she doesn’t. She stays, instead. One night at a time, doing her best to shake off the flight instinct that’s trying to sink its teeth into her. Because she  _ likes _ Tammy, more than she’s ready to admit just yet. She doesn’t  _ want _ to run.

Not wanting to run. A first, for her.

Tammy doesn’t push, almost ever, which is one of the many things Debbie likes about her. She navigates all of this in that way people often do when they are accustomed to taking care of others. Debbie asks her not to tell, and she doesn’t. She is patient and careful, content with doing anything Debbie wants to do, never more. This is just yet another way she differs so vastly from Claude, though Debbie tries her very hardest not to compare them too frequently. It feels like it cheapens what they have, to constantly be thinking, however distantly, about an ex-boyfriend she never had particularly intense positive feelings for.

Most of the time, Tammy likes to let Debbie be the one to initiate everything; this is part of that  _ not pushing _ thing. There are moments, sometimes, though, in which she makes a move that Debbie doesn’t expect until it happens. Slipping her hands under Debbie’s shirt to smooth her palms across her hips, her stomach, her ribs, until her fingers are warm against Debbie’s skin instead of winter-cool. Pressing her lips softly to places like the inside of Debbie’s wrist or the underside of her jawline or the spot where her neck reaches her collarbone. Hovering over Debbie with her knees on either side of her hips, or curling her hands around Debbie’s thighs if Debbie sits that way to pull her as close as she can. All of these things make all the breath catch in Debbie’s chest, make all her nerves sizzle with electricity, and still, Tammy is careful. She’s forever prepared to pull back if Debbie falters, even for just a second, to look her seriously in the eyes. “Is this okay?” she asks, every time, and doesn’t move again until Debbie nods.

Debbie almost always nods.

They have picked up tutoring again, and it is always when Lou’s got Quidditch practice. Sometimes, she can see her best friend out the window from the transfiguration classroom, and though she knows Lou can’t see  _ this _ far and wouldn’t be looking, anyway, she is careful. There are too many other people in this castle who could see them here, and there is a deep-rooted fear in her mind that someone is going to see them sitting here, in desks side by side, and simply  _ know. _ Debbie tries to cautiously keep physical space between them in every space except one, like if she’s within two feet of Tammy, anyone with eyes will be able to  _ see _ the way she feels like she needs to be closer, the way her fingers want to reach for the other girl, the way her gaze drinks in every detail about her and commits each one to memory. Every other member of her family is historically  _ better _ at sorting their feelings into neat little boxes and hiding them away so nobody else can see. Debbie always feels like she has a lot of room for improvement on that front, like she is more transparent than she wants to be.

After Quidditch practice at the beginning of February, Lou knocks on the door frame of the classroom and Debbie practically jumps as she twists to look for the source of the sound. Lou’s eyes sweep over their setup – both of their textbooks opened to different pages, parchment everywhere, Tammy with her chair pulled a little closer to Debbie’s just for a better vantage point to go over her essay. Professor Chang is nowhere in sight, disappeared to put together lesson plans in her office an hour ago. Lou raises an eyebrow so it disappears behind her bangs. They’re getting long again, long enough to hinder her vision a little bit, but Debbie knows she’ll give them more time before cutting them again. “C’mon, Ocean, let’s move,” she says loudly, eyeing Tammy like she’s the enemy. “You’re not dumb enough for this.”

The clock says they’ve gone twenty minutes past their regular end time, and Debbie rolls her parchment up and stuffs it into her bag. “See you later,” she says as smoothly as she can to Tammy, and is rushing out of the room before she can get an answer. It’s a casual enough goodbye that nobody can read into it, not even Lou, because it’s not immediately clear exactly what  _ later _ means.

Lou is barely paying attention, though. She stalks down the corridor with long-legged steps so Debbie has to move a little faster to keep up, hands shoved into the pockets of her robes and a stony expression on her face. For a heartstopping moment, Debbie is sure she’s figured it out, that Lou knows about her and Tammy and didn’t get it from  _ her _ at all. But the words that come out of her best friend’s mouth as they head up a flight of stairs are leaning in completely the other direction.

“I’m going to duel Kluger. I swear.”

Startled, Debbie steps just slightly wrong and falls back a step or two. “W-what?”

Whirling to face her, Lou frowns deeply. “I’m going to  _ duel Kluger,” _ she repeats, slow, lots of emphasis like she thinks the problem is that Debbie hasn’t heard her. She is taller than Debbie always, but right now she’s got the added bonus of being to stairs up, for good measure. “I’ve had it up to  _ here _ with her attitude and I’m tired of her treating me like an idiot every practice just because she made captain. I made one comment tonight –  _ one!  _ – and you know what she’s doing? She’s  _ benching _ me for the next game. Pulling in a damn  _ reserve.” _

Debbie hesitates. 

This is it, she thinks – the big explosion that Lou and Daphne have been gearing up to since first year. Before the end of fifth year, she thinks, she wouldn’t have minded this so much. She didn’t have any reason then to hope, even just a little, that they might work out whatever problems have been rising and rising and rising between them. 

But now –  _ now, _ there is Tammy.  _ Now, _ if they were to work through it all and come out the other side able to simply  _ tolerate _ each other a little more effectively, maybe Debbie wouldn’t feel like she has to keep so many secrets from her best friend. She likes to think that she’d hold Tammy’s hand somewhere other than the astronomy tower, if not for all the issues between the Slytherin girls of their respective social circles. 

“Maybe you should just try talking to her first,” she tries. “Or your head of house. Just to see if you can get through to her without, like, actually jinxing her?”

Lou scoffs. “Merlin, Deb, don’t tell me your tutor’s making you go all soft,” she snaps, and Debbie holds her shoulders perfectly still and swallows down a flinch.

“She’s…” But here, she trails off. What is she supposed to say?  _ She’s more than that, _ the words supply themselves helpfully, and she shoves them back. The sentiment isn’t wrong, but this is not the time or place for actually saying it. Maybe there will never be a proper time or place for it at all. “No, I just don’t want you to get in more shit.”

Her friend rolls her eyes. She’s in such a foul mood that she doesn’t even bother brushing her bangs aside enough for Debbie to see the whole eye-roll. “I really couldn’t care less.” She spins on her heel and carries forward up the stairs, leaving Debbie hovering awkwardly behind her, unsure if she’s supposed to follow. Is this a fight? She’s never fought with Lou about anything before, not really. Then again, it was only recently that she started telling Lou lies. Maybe this is the year that everything about their friendship is going to change. But after several steps, Lou reaches the top of the stairs to the second floor and turns back, heaving a sigh as she looks down at Debbie. “You coming?”

And Debbie does. She and Lou are a package deal, friends until the end of the world. A duel with Daphne Kluger cannot tear them apart.

She thinks maybe the reason she doesn’t feel like she can tell Lou about Tammy is a hundred times more complicated than it looks at first glance. She thinks Lou would understand half of it; it’s the  _ who, _ not the  _ what, _ that is liable to cause problems. It’s looking less and less as if Lou and Daphne are going to get over the exponential number of issues they have built up, and that leaves two directions that telling the truth about Tammy could go. Either she’s going to lose Lou, or she’s going to lose Tammy. The odds of keeping them both are growing slimmer every day; she can feel that window of opportunity closing and closing and closing. Maybe it was never open to begin with.

The problem is that if it came down to it, she doesn’t know how she’s supposed to choose.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...we all know debbie's bad at decisions when it comes to her personal life.
> 
> as always, thank you for reading! feel free to drop me a comment or a kudos (if you haven't already) or yell at me on twitter @deboceans if you really want to. i have a whole thread from months ago that's just my progress writing this au so... @ me or dm me or something there and i'm happy to share it!
> 
> i hope to see u all here again next chapter, when amita's adorable, debtam are still actually close to each other instead of across all of london, and the lou/daphne drama gets a bit of development but not a lot because i'm just as bad at writing conflict as i am at dealing with it myself.


	14. Chapter 14

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "i've been meaning to ask you," says amita suddenly, leaning in close to her. "when did you get the bracelet?"
> 
> startled, tammy looks down. it has become a nervous tic, to play with the bracelet debbie gave her without realizing it. she traces the circle of it when she's in class, has been wearing it non-stop. she thinks it would feel odd to take it off now, like something vital would be missing. right now, she's twisting it around so the clasp journeys again and and again around her wrist, and she stops abruptly and flattens her palm against the table instead. "um, for christmas?" she doesn’t mean for it to come out as a question, but her tone scales upward, anyway.
> 
> at the slytherin table, lou's narrowed eyes are flickering over her and amita. even without daphne around, she mutters something darkly to her friends. reading lips is not a talent of tammy's, but regardless, she watches debbie nod and something in her chest twists.

That night, Debbie has a deep frown and a dark storm raging in her eyes when she gets to the astronomy tower, and Tammy’s heart pounds as she pats the spot on the floor next to her. Debbie sits, and they are quiet, while she waits for the other girl to speak. It’s raining again, and they sit with their backs pressed to the wall only a few feet over from the door, still under the cover of the roof. This is the exact place where Debbie first kissed her.

“Lou wants to duel Daphne,” is how Debbie ends up breaking the silence. She has her knees drawn up close to her chest and her fingers laced together overtop of them, and she’s watching the raindrops hit the floor in front of them. “Tomorrow, maybe. She’s really mad.”

“Oh,” says Tammy softly. This is an inevitable thing, really – the Slytherin girls have been circling each other for years by this point. But it’s felt fuzzy and impractical before, up until this moment, in the way that things are when they feel incredibly far off.  The reality of it comes into glaring focus, now.

With a sigh, Debbie turns her head to look at her curiously. Her eyes are dark, framed by the long eyelashes Tammy has become familiar with, and with the low light from the doorway behind her, everything looks darker still. Her eyes go nearly inky black, and her lashes cast shadows underneath her eyes that make them appear longer. “What are we?” she asks abruptly.

Tammy blinks. “What do you want us to be?” she asks right back. Even, careful, calm, as if her heart hasn’t suddenly started hammering away inside her chest at the sheer number of possibilities, both good and bad, that could stem from this question. 

A brief hesitation hangs here, and she wishes it wouldn’t. It leaves far too much space for Tammy’s mind to roam free and spin wildly out of control, spiralling as it tries to gather together every potential answer Debbie could give and prepare her for all of them at once. Because officially, they aren’t anything at all. Maybe friends. Friends who have been familiarizing themselves with the feel of each other’s lips and tongues and skin. There are no labels here, and Tammy hasn’t felt unsure about that since their  _ second _ kiss, but  _ now _ she does. She drags her focus back as Debbie opens her mouth to speak. “Lou said something earlier and it… it made me start thinking,” she says in a small voice. Small, but not uncertain. “I think I want you to be my girlfriend.”

This sentence seems to knock the wind right out of her. The relief washing over Tammy tells her that this was  _ not _ the possibility she thought was most likely, and as this sinks in, there is absolutely no chance at all of containing her smile. It breaks out across her face as she looks at Debbie, and she should say something more eloquent, probably, except that all she can think to get out is, “Okay. Does that make you  _ my _ girlfriend?”

She is met with a one-sided smile, one corner of Debbie’s mouth quirking upward while the other stays still. “I guess it does, doesn’t it?”

Turning just enough to face Debbie properly, she leans in and drops a kiss to that one corner of her mouth. Before she can pull back again, she feels Debbie’s fingers trailing along her jawline, holding her in place so she can kiss Tammy back purposefully. They stay like that for a while, Tammy isn’t sure how long, soft light kiss after soft light kiss, and it’s beautiful.

Debbie slides her fingers in between Tammy’s and squeezes her hand gently. “I-I should probably say I still don’t know if I’m ready to, you know. Tell people,” she says, all apprehensive, like she is bracing herself for Tammy to say no. “Can it still just be… us?”

She rests her forehead against the other girl’s, nods just a little so that Debbie can feel the movement. “That’s okay,” she whispers back. Because she meant it, back before Christmas, when she said she’s not going to push.  _ You can tell people tomorrow or next month or next year or never, _ she said. She’s not about to change it now just because Debbie feels secure enough to put a label on this. She is perfectly content to call Debbie by this title in only one place, to let the words echo around her head. Debbie, her  _ girlfriend. _ It’s got a nice ring to it.

— • —

The duel is not particularly spectacular, and nobody officially wins. This is mostly because Lou and Daphne start it off in the courtyard in front of the clock tower, which is far too public for the faculty to let carry on. Lou’s blue eyes are blazing with cold fire when she casts her first spell; Daphne blocks it but doesn’t get a chance to retaliate before Professor Weasley and Professor Lupin push their way through the knot of students forming to watch and put a quick end to the whole thing. The two of them are marched off to their head of house and are not seen again until dinner.

“She thinks she  _ won,” _ says Daphne scathingly as she takes her usual seat next to Rose. “Because she’s the only one who got a curse in, even if I countered.”

Amita’s eyes are wide. Taking part in an actual duel is absolutely out of the question for her, and it shows on her face. “Did you get in trouble?”

Daphne rolls her eyes. “Yeah.  _ Neither _ of us are allowed to play in our next game now. It’s going to throw a wrench in our whole season, I swear, and it’s  _ all _ her fault.” 

She eats fast, fork clattering angrily against her plate, clearly not in the mood to talk about anything besides Lou Miller, and then she and Rose make their exit. With any luck, Rose will work her usual magic in calming her girlfriend down before Daphne goes back to her common room; Tammy is more than a little worried that the tension might break out into another duel in the Slytherin dormitories tonight.

“I’ve been meaning to ask you,” says Amita suddenly, leaning in close to her once their friends have disappeared out into the Entrance Hall. “When did you get the bracelet?”

Startled, Tammy looks down. It has become a nervous tic, perhaps, to play with the bracelet Debbie gave her without realizing it. She traces the circle of it when she’s in class, has been wearing it non-stop so that it feels like an extension of herself. She thinks it would feel odd to take it off now, like something vital would be missing. Right now, she’s twisting it around so the clasp journeys again and again around her wrist, and she stops abruptly and flattens her palm against the table next to her plate instead. “Um, for Christmas?” She doesn’t mean for it to come out as a question, but her tone scales upward, anyway.

“I thought you said your mum didn’t…” Amita trails off, and she can practically see the wheels turning in her head. The other girl is detail-oriented, pays attention to things people say around her and commits them to memory. Of  _ course _ she remembers that Tammy mentioned, if only very briefly, the monetary issues she and her mother are facing. It doesn’t take long for her to figure it out, and she gasps lightly as her eyes fly to meet Tammy’s. “Oh, my God. It’s from  _ her,  _ isn’t it? Shit. It’s beautiful. Wow.” Again, she doesn’t push Tammy for a name. She only runs her fingers wonderingly over the silver for a moment and then moves forward.

At the Slytherin table, Lou’s narrowed eyes are flickering over her and Amita. Even without Daphne around, she mutters something darkly to her friends. Reading lips is not a talent of Tammy’s, but regardless, she watches Debbie nod and something in her chest twists.

— • —

Up on their tower, she kisses Debbie until every worry in her head melts away. Presses herself forward so Debbie leans back, until Debbie’s back aligns with the floor and the angle changes altogether. She slides her hands down until her fingers brush the waistband of Debbie’s pyjama pants and then back up, underneath her sweater to bare skin. “Is this okay?” she whispers into the corner of Debbie’s jaw, just under her ear.

It takes a moment for Debbie to catch her breath enough to answer. “Yeah,” she whispers back, and trails her fingers from Tammy’s knees to her hips. Skates them up close to her shoulders, where she pushes the black jacket away until it falls, and leans up to press her lips to Tammy’s. She follows the same path Tammy’s hands did now: Down to her hips again to skim up under her shirt, and every inch of Tammy’s skin hums at her touch. Debbie’s mouth travels to her cheek, over the outline of her face to her neck, down to her collarbone. She draws the neckline of Tammy’s T-shirt aside for better access, taking a sharp inhale there when Tammy touches somewhere new. “Shit,” she murmurs into Tammy’s skin, and pulls away enough to tug at the bottom hem of her shirt, up and up and up. “You’re so beautiful.”

“Debbie,” is all she can say. She can’t say it properly, either; it comes out soft and breathless and her heart is beating too fast.  _ I think I’m in love with you, _ her head says, but maybe neither of them are ready to say that one out loud just yet, and all she can really focus on is Debbie and her hands and her lips, and so she keeps the words held on her tongue and presses them into her skin silently, instead.

Later, it starts to rain again, and they gather their things to move under the cover of the roof. They sit by the door again, and Debbie reaches for Tammy’s hand and laces their fingers together, and Tammy brushes her lips soft over Debbie’s shoulder before her sweater covers it up again. She focuses in on the way that Debbie’s thumb is tracing circles on the back of her hand, the way that every single one of her nerves seems to have been awakened, the way that the rain sounds and how quiet everything else is and how  _ comfortable _ it feels. With Sarah, this part was awkward. With Debbie, though, it is different. Natural, like discovering a part of herself that she didn’t know was there but is unquestionably right.

“Are you tired?” she asks. They should be parting ways now; it’s late, and she has an essay to take a final look over in the morning before handing it in.

Debbie shakes her head, grip tightening slightly on her hand. “No,” she says emphatically, watching the raindrops reach the floor just past their feet. They are wavering closer and closer to snow, perhaps a little more solid than regular raindrops. “I want to be here.”

And so Tammy stays longer. She’s been learning that it is near impossible to say no to Debbie Ocean. Besides, she’d rather be here, too.

— • —

The day after Valentine’s Day is a Saturday and, even better, it’s a Hogsmeade weekend. The corridors buzz with energy as Tammy makes her way downstairs, and she can’t exactly blame the other students for this. She, too, has a little bit of a bounce in her step today, a buoyant floating feeling that she might simply take off and never touch the ground again. She is meeting Debbie in that alley by the Hog’s Head again, at half past eleven, which gives her about an hour with her friends before she needs to find a reason to sneak away. Amita is already on board to cover for her again; she can be talked into almost anything, when she knows she’s the only person in possession of such a big secret. It makes her swell with the feeling of importance, though Tammy worries sometimes whether that will change if she ever finds out the mystery girl’s identity.

Daphne holds up a soft scarf with glittering gold threads sewn into it, outlining flower petals and leaves. “Do you think Rose would like this?” she asks Tammy abruptly, turning slightly so her body blocks it from Rose’s view across the shop they’re in. She doesn’t wait for a real answer; Daphne’s head often moves too quickly for such things. Nodding decisively, she tucks the scarf over her arm. “You know what, I think she will. I’m gonna get it. Can you, like, help Amita distract her for a minute?”

There is another scarf here, similar except that it’s got silver threads instead of gold and there are no flowers, only seashells and ocean waves. It makes her think immediately of Debbie, only the price tag reads too high and even if it didn’t, there’s no way she could get away with buying it without her friends seeing. She doesn’t even let herself pick it up, just trails her fingers over the fabric momentarily and then forces herself to move away. She made Debbie promise not to get her anything for today, anyway, pinky-swore and everything. Wizards and witches do not pinky-swear, she has learned, but she taught Debbie the concept last week for this sole purpose.

It proves easier to steal away this time than it was before Christmas, if only because the Valentine’s Day trip means Daphne and Rose already want to split off from them at the most opportune of moments. Amita wrinkles her nose playfully as she waves them off. “Have fun  _ drowning  _ in confetti at Madam Puddifoot’s,” she calls as they retreat, and checks her watch as she turns back to face Tammy. All bright and cheerful, she asks, “You said half past, right? You should go.”

Tammy hesitates. “Are you sure that’s okay? I didn’t think I’d end up, you know, leaving you all alone.” But Amita shoos her away down the street anyway, swearing she’ll be fine, she’s going to wander around and do some shopping, she needs new quills and more parchment and wants to go to Honeydukes. “I’ll meet you there in an hour,” Tammy promises before she goes. “Don’t buy all the candy without me!”

She gets to the little hollowed-out part of the alley first this time, only has to wait maybe a minute before Debbie arrives and backs her up against the wall to kiss her once, twice, three times. “Hi,” she mumbles into Tammy’s lips after that, curling her fingers around the open, zippered edges of her coat. “You know, I had to fake sick to get away. I’m going to have to sneak back up to the castle after this and pretend to take a nap.”

Brushing her knuckles over Debbie’s cheekbone, Tammy smiles, just a little. “You could probably actually use a nap,” she points out. They both could, really – it’s been months now functioning on too little sleep, and maybe the shadowy parts under both their eyes have set in enough to be permanent. For a wild moment, Tammy entertains the idea that maybe, one of these days, one day  _ soon, _ Debbie might be ready to share this secret with the people around her. That maybe the astronomy tower and this spot in a back alley of Hogsmeade won’t be the only places they can be together.

But she swore she wouldn’t push the Gryffindor into anything, no matter how difficult it is to date someone who doesn’t want to tell the world about her. Someone who maybe has trouble admitting, even to herself, that this is as real as it feels.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> they're so cute, it literally makes my heart hurt? what the fuck? anyway, if you've made it this far, thank you! we're officially 2/3 of the way through this story, which i guess puts us on the home stretch or something. crazy. can't believe y'all are still reading it, tbh? but thank you so much for the time you're dedicating to my dumb words! feel free to leave a comment or kudos, or come hang out with me on twitter, it's @deboceans!
> 
> see you next chapter, maybe, when debbie goes on a giant internal monologue about her problems, we rapidly approach easter break, and some other stuff that i don't want to be any more specific about but it still very important happens.


	15. Chapter 15

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> tammy says it’s important to feel ready, that everyone gets there at different times. “it’s not about me or lou or danny or anyone. it’s not about anyone else but you,” she advises, one night when debbie’s head is resting on her shoulder. the times when they used to sit with space carefully held between them are distant, fuzzy memories, now. tammy’s fingers dance through the ends of debbie’s hair, feather-light. “you get to decide who you tell and when you tell them. you don’t have to force it.” so she keeps every word about tammy under her tongue and worries that they will all spill out when she doesn’t mean for them to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you know what? this is hella early, but it's my birthday for another two hours and i wanted to give you guys something today. weird, maybe, because it's a little bit backwards, but i've been thinking about uploading the next chapter ahead of schedule all day long, so here i am. i hope you like it!
> 
> EDIT: OH MY GOD, IT'S EVILSHIPPER'S BIRTHDAY TOMORROW. happy birthday!!! i was already updating early because of my birthday but i wanted to edit this in and dedicate this chapter to you because you're one of my most dedicated readers (!!!) and comment on almost every single chapter, and i love you??? i hope you have an amazing day!

There is nobody to talk to about anything happening with Tammy, and this is more of a problem than Debbie originally anticipated. 

The Oceans are  _ good _ at keeping things to themselves. She is  _ supposed  _ to be able to handle sitting on a secret like this. And she can – of course, she can, it’s been months and she’s barely admitted aloud to anyone besides Tammy herself that they’re even something like friends. Debbie can keep a lid on this forever, if she needs to.

The problem is more that she begins to  _ want _ to tell people. That is what she doesn’t quite expect. Every new development with Tammy is some kind of milestone she wants to share with  _ someone, _ to prove that it’s all really happening, to validate the way her feelings for the other girl seem to be simply growing deeper and deeper roots. Maybe she didn’t anticipate this because it has never been like  _ this _ with anyone else, and certainly not Claude.

Tammy is different. Tammy changes everything.

Regardless, she can’t tell anyone. Lou’s mood has been steadily worsening all year and has only reached new lows since the duel (if it really counted as a duel at all). She loves Constance, but the girl won’t be able to keep her mouth shut, and Nine-Ball is up to her eyes in homework for too many classes and has decided she wants to read every book in the school library by graduation next year. Danny is too far away and she can’t fathom writing this into a letter and half of it she doesn’t want to tell her big brother, of all people, anyway. Her father is absolutely out of the question, would never in a million years accept the idea of her seeing anyone besides a pureblood Slytherin boy destined for the Ministry. The fact that she even considers the man for half a second just proves how desperately she wants to be able to say Tammy’s name out loud – she’s eliminated every other possibility and he is all she’s left with.

She can’t figure out whether she is more hesitant to be open about Tammy because of the Ravenclaw girl’s friends or because she isn’t a  _ he.  _ All she knows for sure is that there is a stark, black-and-white difference between acknowledging her feelings internally, and actually telling people. Saying the words aloud would make it real, something tangible, something she could maybe never take back.  _ It’s okay to be scared, _ Tammy told her, the first night anyone else found out, when John Frazier climbed to the top of their tower and promised he wouldn’t tell.  _ You can tell people tomorrow or next month or next year or never. _

Tammy says it’s important to  _ feel _ ready, that everyone gets there at different times. “It’s not about me or Lou or Danny or anyone. It’s not about anyone else but you,” she advises, one night when Debbie’s head is resting on her shoulder. The times when they used to sit with space carefully held between them are distant, fuzzy memories, now. Tammy’s fingers dance through the ends of Debbie’s hair, feather-light. “You get to decide who you tell and when you tell them. You don’t have to force it.”

So she keeps every word about Tammy under her tongue and worries that they will all spill out when she doesn’t mean for them to.

Despite Tammy’s words, the careful and cautious and encouraging way she approaches the issue, Debbie thinks she can  _ feel _ the other girl getting tired. It’s as if all of Debbie’s secrets are starting to weigh down on her shoulders, tying themselves around her ankles so they drag behind her when she walks. She hides it well enough from almost everyone (“I just have  _ so much _ homework to do, no matter how much I study,” she has overheard Tammy telling Rose on more than one occasion), but she’s not as good at burying it as Debbie is. Or perhaps Debbie has gotten under her guards just as much as Tammy has gotten under hers, so she just sees more at first glance. Sixth year is exhausting enough, between classes and homework and Tammy’s Quidditch practices and tutoring, without adding all the long nights at the castle’s tallest tower or lying to all of her friends or pretending she hasn’t been getting to know Debbie inside and out since last June.

Even so, Debbie still doesn’t feel _ ready.  _ She wavers back and forth, unable to really make up her mind. One day the steam from Tammy’s cauldron is making the ends of her blonde hair curl, and she thinks maybe it would be  _ nice, _ to be able to turn to Nine-Ball next to her and admit she’s messed up every other step on her own potion so far because her girlfriend is so damn  _ pretty _ she can’t concentrate. But that afternoon, Lou lies across three chairs in the library and stares at the ceiling to rant about what Daphne did at Quidditch practice, and any courage she had built up since potions evaporates immediately. One night, she dozes off with her head in Tammy’s lap and fingers combing carefully through her hair, and she dreams about lying like this on the shore of the lake below them when the weather gets nicer again, dreams about not caring who sees. Three days later, Claude walks Penelope Stern out into the grounds for Care or Magical Creatures and kisses her soundly at the gate, eyes finding Debbie’s smugly before he heads back to the castle, and Constance is calling him a jackass under her breath and asking if she’s  _ okay.  _ She wishes, more than anything, that she was ready to give a truthful answer: That she is okay, because she was never in love with Claude Becker, and she has someone else now, and she doesn’t know if  _ love _ is the right word, but it definitely feels miles closer than it did with him. But she keeps her mouth pressed firmly shut and only nods.

She feels guilty about this, when she thinks too hard about all the things she is making Tammy keep from everyone around her, about how Tammy promised she wouldn’t push her and is so set on keeping her word that she would rather carry these heavy secrets around the castle than say anything. It softens something deep inside Debbie’s soul, makes her fall just a little farther, even if she has a very real concern that at some point, she’ll have fallen so far that she can’t get up. Tammy deserves better than  _ this, _ she thinks. Deserves better than someone like her who can’t wrap her head around telling anyone about them, doesn’t know whether Tammy or Lou would win out in a battle of importance because she can’t even bring herself to think about the possible consequences. There is a nearly-visible effect on the way Tammy holds herself in daylight now, and  _ Debbie  _ has done that to her.  _ Debbie _ is weighing her down.

Willing herself to be ready takes time, which is probably why Tammy keeps saying not to force it. She’s smart, has been through this, in a way, all on her own without someone to guide her through it. Still, telling Debbie Ocean not to do something is not usually the most effective method of guidance, and the quiet acknowledgement that she is making so many aspects of Tammy’s life  _ difficult  _ only makes her want to push the boundaries a little more. Test them until she finds out what parts of the ground can hold her weight.

And so, towards the end of March, Debbie takes a deep breath when she reaches the top of the stairs and takes one of Tammy’s hands in each of hers and says nervously, “I think I want to tell my friends about you. About us. I think I’m ready.”

“Debbie,” says Tammy, soft, cautious. Her hands curl tightly over the edge of Debbie’s palms and her teeth dig into her lip as she lets her gaze slide over every facial feature. “Do you… do you think, or do you  _ know?” _

“I think I know,” answers Debbie, which is not particularly reassuring, but she tries to convey the gravity of this as much as she can. “I want to tell them. I’ll tell them tomorrow.”

And Tammy nods. “Okay,” she agrees, and maybe Debbie imagines it, but she thinks she can actually see a little bit of the heaviness lift away.

Of course, that’s easier said than done, and she definitely does not tell them tomorrow. “Tomorrow,” she says again that night, and then, “I’m telling them on Saturday, after the Quidditch match,” the next night. She puts it off again and again, over and over. A day here, a week there. Reaches for reasons when  _ I just didn’t know how to say it _ begins to become too repetitive. Lou and Daphne’s latest drama, or a big upcoming test she doesn’t want to distract anyone from, or just not feeling like it was the right  _ time. _

She is growing increasingly frustrated with herself, with how difficult she has been finding it to be ready.  _ Don’t rush it, _ Tammy has been saying all along. But she’s accustomed to rushing things, the ability to nudge everything else out of the way and get something done out of sheer determination. It’s just that this is different. Maybe it’s simply too important. Every time she starts to get close, something slams on the brakes.

And still, Tammy doesn’t push. Every time the conversation is put off yet again, she keeps quiet, focuses instead on supporting Debbie.  _ It’s okay if you’re not ready, _ she says, every time. Debbie can’t tell if she’s imagining the belief draining slowly out of the words each time they are said again. She holds her breath when she gets to the astronomy tower on all the nights she was supposed to have told her friends, wondering if this will be the time that Tammy snaps. She’s going to have to, right? Or does she not realize that she deserves more than this?

The snap doesn’t come until mid-April, drawing up closer to Easter break. Debbie has been preparing herself for this for nearly a month now, and still, it hits so hard it knocks the wind out of her. It comes not with anger but instead with a tired sort of disappointment that somehow stings more. She sits with her arms wrapped tight around herself and Tammy doesn’t look at her while she explains the latest cop-out reason why she didn’t tell them today, again. She looks at Tammy, though. Sees what might be the last little sliver of hope deflate out of her so her shoulders sink, sees the tiny shake of her head and the way her mouth turns down at the corners, sees the numb, broken sadness in her eyes when she finally turns her head to meet Debbie’s gaze.

“Is this just a game to you?” she asks, and  _ that’s _ what steals all the oxygen away. Tammy takes her breath away constantly, it seems, but this is different. Sadder. Colder.

She tears her gaze away in an effort to be able to breathe again. It works, sort of, not really. “No, I… It’s not a game. What does that even mean?”

Tammy sighs, light but noticeable enough that the sound carries to her ears. “It’s okay if you’re not ready to say anything,” she says again, gentle. Still trying to take care of Debbie, the way she has been since last summer; it’s in her nature, not the type of thing she can simply let go of. “Really. It is. I just – please don’t keep telling me you’re ready if you aren’t. I can’t keep getting my hopes up like that. If you still don’t want to tell anyone, it’s fine. I’ll be fine, I promise.” She leans over and kisses Debbie’s cheek softly, the tip of her nose, ghosts her lips across Debbie’s before moving to stand. “Good night, Debbie.”

“I think I’m in love with you,” she replies. Tammy freezes momentarily, long enough for Debbie to get her feet under herself and straighten up so they’re face to face. She stands just barely taller, maybe an inch, and they are so close she can see every one of Tammy’s eyelashes in the light from the door.

“Debbie,” she sighs. Her eyes aren’t as open as they are normally, like a film has slid over them to hide something away. “You don’t ha–”

“No, listen. I wanted to say that. You don’t have to say it back,” says Debbie, feeling like she’s stumbling over the words, like they aren’t coming out clearly enough. “I’m sorry I haven’t told anyone. I wanted to, it’s just that it’s – it’s hard. But this isn’t, this is easy.” And it  _ is _ easy, maybe gaining its smoothness as she goes, like it’s something she’s been supposed to say forever. As if she has been bottling it up for too long and now the floodgates have opened, and it’s out there, and maybe she’ll never grow tired of saying it. “I love you.”

_ You don’t have to say it back, _ she said, but she’s holding her breath again as she goes quiet. Tammy hands find her hips to pull her closer, though, and she rises up a little to kiss her again. It’s more solid than the sad one from before, and when she pulls back, she smiles so her eyes go back to the way Debbie likes them. They sparkle a little when she speaks, carefully forming each word. “I love you, too. I think I have for a while now.”

— • —

This time, Danny and Tess are both there, side by side, when the Hogwarts Express pulls into the train station. Her brother grins easily as she reaches them, loading her things onto a trolley and spinning the handle out of her way with a flourish, and she laughs. He ruffles Lou’s hair and she scowls at him, and Debbie hugs her best friend tight. “Don’t do anything  _ too _ crazy, okay?”

“Yeah, yeah. I swear I’ll leave the whole continent of Australia unscathed.” The sarcasm is positively dripping from every syllable, but nonetheless, she holds onto Debbie maybe a little longer than she regularly does. The summer will be better for her, Debbie thinks. Two full months that Lou will be away from Daphne, and she will be at home instead of jetting off to Australia to see her extended family. It will leave the girl time to get a proper hold on everything again, and then maybe seventh year will run more smoothly. Debbie can tell that she’s not happy this year, though Lou isn’t the type of person to talk freely about it. She will complain about Daphne until the end of time, probably, but the more emotional depths are locked up tight. Any other year, Debbie might feel okay about pushing and prying to shed some light on them, but not now. Not when she’s got her own secrets shut away out of sight.

Being back at home again, with Danny hanging around so she’s not entirely on her own, brings these secrets up to hover close to the surface, dangerously close to being let out into the open. She spends two and a half days practicing how to say it in her head, and sits down at dinner that night with determination coursing through all her veins. It’s just the two of them at a too-big dining room table tonight; their father is stuck late at work, as usual, and Tess is out with a couple of her friends. “I have to tell you something,” she says, starts off that way because it makes it harder to back out now.

Danny twirls a fork between his fingers. “Shoot,” he prompts her amicably.

Her heart thumps erratically as she tries to remember how, exactly, she’s decided is the best way to get the words out. She just wants to have  _ someone _ who knows, someone besides John Frazier because he won’t tell anyone but she also doesn’t think she can talk to him about it, maybe ever. “I, well, you know how I was telling you I’m sort of… friends with Tammy Prescott?” she asks. Danny nods slowly, and in the hesitation that follows, she swears she can see one side of his mouth tug upward in a tiny smile that lights something up in his eyes. Is he starting to figure it out before she can even put the words forth, or is she imagining that? She breaks eye contact again, the way she always seems to when she’s saying something important, and focuses heavily on winding pasta noodles around her fork. Her palms are sweating and she holds the cutlery too tightly so he hopefully can’t see that her fingers are shaking. In an awkward, rambling rush, Debbie manages, “Well, I kind of – we’re kind of actually, um, seeing each other. Like, dating. I’m dating Tammy and she’s my – my girlfriend, and I guess I’m bi, and so… Um. Yeah. That’s all.”

She dares to look up for a moment, now, when she’s fallen silent again. Whether she imagined the smile before or not, there’s definitely one there now. It spreads across her brother’s face slowly, crooked but bright, and maybe there’s even a spark of satisfaction there. “You and Tammy, huh?” He points his fork at her and nods. “Okay. Yeah, I guess I can see it. So when did that happen?”

And she tells him. It feels nice, to get the story off her chest, even if she wraps it up at the end by making him promise, again, not to tell anyone. Her food grows cold in front of her and she doesn’t care. It’s as if she has shed a heavy weight, and Danny takes every bit of information in stride, just like Tammy said her mum did. Maybe Debbie missed all the chances to talk to her own mother about this, the timing not lining up the way it would have needed to, but Danny’s acceptance wraps itself around her and feels like safety.

Later, after they put their dishes in the sink, Danny traps her in a hug, right there in the middle of the kitchen. “You seem happy about this,” he says when he steps back, looking very carefully into her eyes and still not letting go of her shoulders so she has to look back. “You deserve that. I’m proud of you, kiddo.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PROGRESS??? PROGRESS IS BEING MADE???
> 
> as always, thank you for reading! if you want to leave me comments or kudos or come visit me on twitter – @deboceans – i'll absolutely love you forever. not about to try and corner you into it because it's my birthday or anything, but... it's my birthday. (shut up, rachel.)
> 
> see you next chapter, when someone goes for a hospital visit, and tammy has a heart-to-heart with someone. not saying who for either of those things because, hey, i've got to keep you guys on your toes. if you need to yell at me for that, you know how to get in touch with me, i suppose.


	16. Chapter 16

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> she moves through the rest of easter break in a blur. she can’t focus on anything, which is almost a blessing in disguise because it means she’s hardly affected by the way nadine and her family watch their steps around her. they are still entirely uncomfortable with her, with everything about her. she is a burden they only have to deal with over the holidays, and she does not fit smoothly into their home, and nobody wants to put in the time to make it work when she will be taking the train back to school so soon. maybe they’re still a little scared of her, too, like they haven’t known her for sixteen years and counting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well, here we are: chapter 16. after a mishap yesterday where i tweeted that i was going to upload in 2 hours, and then i got home and my cousins were coming over for dinner. and then i said that i'd upload after they left, and then i got distracted and... didn't. sorry to the handful of you who were excited, whoops. anyway, here goes!

Early on Saturday morning, Tammy wakes up to tapping at the window. Lilith is perched on the outer ledge of the sill with a thin roll of parchment tied to her leg, and soars away again as soon as Tammy has removed it. Debbie has scrawled four fragmented sentences across the page, crooked and a little smudged, without even stopping to write Tammy’s name at the start or her own at the end. She goes very still as the words register.

_Danny got hurt on an Auror job yesterday. I told him about you. Can’t write more. Going to St Mungo’s now._

Debbie will be holding herself together, she’s sure. She always seems to. But this, _now,_ under a year after spending last summer at St Mungo’s with her mum, might be too much. Too much pressure, too much worry. It doesn’t say how badly Danny is hurt, but if it’s serious, maybe there will be too much loss, too. Tammy’s insides seem to twist at the thought. She wants to be there, close enough to help, but she hasn’t asked.

Except that there’s one part standing out: _I told him about you._ She reads the letter through twice more, trying to see between the words on the page and into the intention behind them. Is this Debbie’s way of asking her to come, without really asking? If there is one thing she knows about Debbie by this point, it’s that she doesn’t like to appear vulnerable. The last read-through only cements this possibility in her head.

Springing into movement, she turns away from the window. The room is small and a little crowded with the sofa pulled out to make space for her to sleep, and she climbs up and over it to get to her mum’s bed. “Mum, wake up,” she hisses, waiting until her mother blinks sleepily at her. She holds the scrap of parchment out and her mum has to pry it out of her fingers to be able to read it. “Her brother’s in the hospital,” says Tammy. “Do you think she means she wants me to go?”

She navigates public transit into the bustling downtown of London and goes to the Leaky Cauldron for information, because she has no idea how to actually get _into_ St Mungo’s. An elderly witch takes her, already going in to visit her husband. “Are you going to be okay, dear?” she asks when they’ve made it into the lobby of the hospital, and when Tammy gives as certain of a nod as she can muster, the woman hobbles away without looking back.

This is all going quite well until the receptionist at the desk refuses to tell her where Danny’s room is. “I’m sorry, honey, I can’t disclose that information to anyone but family,” she explains, though she doesn’t look particularly apologetic as she says it. Frustrated, Tammy spins away from the desk and circles the lobby, trying to think. One circle, two, three.

“Tammy?”

She turns automatically towards the voice, the familiarity of it, focusing in on Debbie so that all the noise and people around her seem to fade right out of existence. She looks exhausted, worry creasing at every line of her face, dark hair pulled up into a messy bun, and she’s wearing the thrift-store sweater Tammy gave her for Christmas and holding two to-go coffee cups in a cardboard tray. There is a moment where everything feels frozen, giving her doubt the time to creep in at the edges of her mind and whisper that she shouldn’t have come – but then the clock ticks forward and Debbie is crossing the space between them to wrap her arms around Tammy like she’s slipping underwater and Tammy is a life preserver. She does this right there in front of everyone, and nobody even bats an eye. Really, nobody pays them any attention at all.

“Is it – is it okay that I’m here?” she asks nervously. She can’t stop thinking that maybe this is not what Debbie’s letter meant at all. “The lady at the desk wouldn’t tell me where Danny was. I can go. I just thou–”

“No, stay. I’m glad you’re here.” Debbie ushers her past the reception desk, fluttering her fingers in a wave to the woman there. “She’s good, Wendy, she’s with me. Ridiculous,” she adds under her breath to Tammy as they climb the stairs. “She let my friends in last summer. Lou’s really good at convincing people to break rules for her. I – my dad was here earlier, but he had to go to work. Danny and Tess are fine, but can you… can you go before he gets back?” Tammy nods automatically, opens her mouth to ask about Danny, but can’t get the question out before Debbie is hurrying on. “Danny’s team was hunting down some dark wizards or something. Nobody will tell me much. Something about stolen artefacts and black markets, I don’t know. He got hit in the crossfire with a few different curses all at once, but he’s going to be okay, I think, now. He was awake for a bit, earlier. They’re healing him up and trying to force him to stay off his feet, which he _hates.”_

They reach the fourth floor and Debbie reaches for Tammy’s arm to tug her to the door, past a sign that reads _Spell Damage._ She carefully releases Tammy as they move down the corridor, a step ahead the whole way until she makes a sharp right turn into Danny’s room. “Is he still asleep?” she whispers, as Tammy hovers in the doorway, only able to see half of her brother’s space. She sets the coffee cups on a small table next to the bed. “This one’s yours. Hey, um, while I was down there, look who I found.” She turns back to look to Tammy, beckoning her forward; Tammy’s feet carry her one step and then another like they have a mind of their own.

The other person here is Tess, which would have been more obvious if Tammy hadn’t been so focused on Debbie since she got here. “Tammy, hey,” she smiles, standing to hug her, as well. She isn’t sure she’s ever hugged Tess Meddows before, despite having known her since she first arrived at Hogwarts – being in the same house and going on patrols together once Tammy became a prefect – but the older girl gives the sort of embraces that envelope her in warmth and softness, and it’s easy enough to melt into. She looks about as tired as Debbie is, clothes a little wrinkled like she’s been at St Mungo’s without so much as moving since Danny got admitted. Still, she comes across as being somehow put-together. Some things are unchanging. “It’s really nice of you to come,” says Tess sincerely, then lowers her voice as she glances at Debbie. Like it’s a secret, she adds, “I think it’s good for her, to have you here.”

She doesn’t say anything else about the matter, doesn’t even visibly react when Debbie pulls up an extra chair next to her own so Tammy can sit and reaches absentmindedly for her hand. Tammy is grateful for this, for the people around Debbie who _know_ now taking the news in so smoothly. It’s encouraging, for Debbie to get the positive responses right off the bat. “He basically said he’s just glad I’m happy,” Debbie tells her when Tess has stepped out in search of a washroom. “He said he’s proud of me. I just – then this happened the very next day, so… I got all wrapped up in all the worst-case scenarios. Like that might be the… the last thing.”

Danny cracks one eye open. “You’re not getting rid of me that easy, Deb,” he promises, voice scratchy and dry. She’s out of her seat in a flash, releasing Tammy’s hand to fill a glass of water for him, pressing a hand softly to his shoulders when he tries to sit up too quickly. “Where’d Tess go?”

“Just the bathroom. She’ll be back in a minute. You have to stay _still,_ Danny.”

“I’m _fine,”_ he grumbles, in exactly the long-suffering tone of voice Tammy is sure Debbie would be using if their situations were reversed. She stays quiet, observant, watching the proceedings and feeling a little like an outsider. She knows Debbie, of course, and knows Tess, but she knows Danny least of all. Has spoken to him maybe a handful of times, never anything particularly significant. It feels like it’s incredibly clear that her presence is mostly for Debbie and not so much for him.

“The Healers are just being cautious, Danny,” sighs Tess when she gets back, and makes him swear he won’t try to sit up again. “The sooner you _cooperate_ and let them do their jobs, the sooner we can go home.”

He looks better than Tammy might have expected, for someone who’s been hit with six different spells all at one time; the potions the Healers have been giving him are doing their jobs. Moving too fast brings a wince to his face, though, and it seems to take a lot of effort to drink the water Debbie puts in his hands. He’s got fading bruises and cuts criss-crossing his skin, but he looks Tammy over from head to toe to the best of his ability. He already knows her, sort of, but he frowns at her, anyway. “You know, if you hurt my little sister, I’m going to have to hex you or something. I know some pretty good ones that could land you in here.”

Debbie rolls her eyes, leaning back in her chair so the front two legs rise up off the floor. “You don’t look super threatening right now, Danny,” she points out.

Tammy nods, though. “Yes, sir.”

She doesn’t know if she’s capable of hurting Debbie, truthfully. Debbie holds enough of her heart that she could break it just by adjusting her grip, but Tammy wonders, sometimes, whether she wields that same power. It seems unlikely at first glance – Debbie Ocean is guarded enough that she is very nearly untouchable, unruffled by anything around her. But getting closer to her has taught Tammy where to find all the little faults and flaws and cracks in those walls. Debbie is more fragile than she likes to let on. Maybe, if she isn’t careful enough, it’s not out of the question. The concept is enough to classify as frightening.

She stays at the hospital all day, until the clock reads ten minutes to five and Debbie leans over to whisper in her ear, “My dad’s supposed to get off work at five.” She walks Tammy past the three other patients here to the door, checks the sightline back into the room to be sure nobody is looking, and kisses her swiftly. “Thanks for coming,” she says, very quietly. “I’ll write tonight, or maybe tomorrow.” She traces her fingertips along Tammy’s jaw and smiles in the way she wouldn’t if a Healer hadn’t told them two hours ago that Danny will probably be discharged tomorrow afternoon. “It felt really good, telling Danny. I-I don’t know if I’m ready for anyone else yet, but it was nice. I’m glad I did it.” She presses her lips to Tammy’s again, brief and sweet, and is smiling possibly even brighter when she pulls back. “I’ll see you the first day back, okay?”

Tammy passes Elijah Ocean on the stairs, when she’s going down and he’s going up. She recognizes him from his picture in the newspapers, and he looks more like Debbie than she ever thought he did before. It’s something in the serious set of his face, maybe. He brushes past her without sparing her a second glance, but it still makes her heart leap up into her throat.

— • —

She moves through the rest of Easter break in a blur.

She can’t focus on anything, which is almost a blessing in disguise because it means she’s hardly affected by the way Nadine and her family watch their steps around her. They are still entirely uncomfortable with her, with everything about her. She is a burden they only have to deal with over the holidays, and she does not fit smoothly into their home, and nobody wants to put in the time to make it work when she will be taking the train back to school so soon.

Maybe they’re still a little scared of her, too, like they haven’t known her for sixteen years and counting.

Michael is perhaps the only exception; he is softer in some ways than his relatives, has a connection with Tammy simply because they’ve known each other since infancy. There is an automatic, unthinking relationship there, maybe not like actual siblings but at least familial. Perhaps this dynamic has been a little dormant in the time since Tammy and her mum moved into his house last summer, but he corners her in the kitchen on Sunday afternoon after he gets back from church, loosening his tie as he eyes her. “Where’d you disappear to yesterday?”

Like Christmas Eve, Tammy and her mum didn’t go to church with the others today. Instead, they spent the morning sitting on the back porch with too much Easter chocolate, rolling the little foil wrappers into tiny spheres and trying to toss them into empty coffee mugs they lined up five feet away. Her mother won by a landslide. Tammy doesn’t have good aim; this is why she plays Keeper, not Chaser. She tips the first mug over the trash can so all the wrappers roll out in a flurry of colour. “My… friend’s brother is in the hospital,” she answers as she sets the mug down on the counter and reaches for the next one. “I just went to make sure she was, you know, okay. Not alone.”

“That’s nice of you,” he mumbles, pulling the tie off entirely and distractedly beginning to roll it up from one end. “Is he going to be okay? The brother?”

“I think so, yeah.” Then they both go quiet, aside from Michael drumming his fingers lightly on the cold glass stovetop and the faint clink of each mug being set on the counter until she’s emptied them all out. She moves for the door, the hallway after it.

“Hey, Tammy?” He’s waited to speak until she’s in the doorway, so it frames her there when she turns back to look at him curiously. He leans against the counter and seems to test words out silently for another moment or two before deciding which ones to go with. “I know things have been kind of weird since we all found out about… well, you. I just wanted to say sorry.”

She nods, gives him a tiny twist of a smile. Doesn’t say it’s okay, because it isn’t, really. “I was thinking I might go for a walk,” she says finally. She’d like to make her way over to her old home, again. Just to see it. “Do you want to come with me?”

He wavers for just a moment, and she thinks he’s going to say no. He’s taken that first step in bridging the gap brought upon them by the witch secret, and that is enough, for now. Maybe they won’t be able to get any further until the summer, or next Christmas. That thought is a little sad, but she can handle it.

But he doesn’t say no, in the end. “Yeah, all right,” he agrees, and trails after her down the hallway. She feels good about this, positive, optimistic. She’s missed him, their age-old friendship, since the summer.

They walk in silence, at first, looking completely mismatched – Michael in his church suit, sans tie, and Tammy in leggings and one of her dad’s battered old hoodies. She pushes her hands deep into the pockets and Michael lets her lead the way, following quietly with every turn she makes. He doesn’t ask where they’re going, apparently content to go anywhere at all. She wonders if his mother would worry, if she knew he was somewhere with her, alone. He didn’t tell her where he was going, just that he was heading out for a bit. Maybe he knew she would try to find a reason for him to stay, if he said who he was going _with._

“Why didn’t you tell me, before?” he asks, when they are eight minutes away from his house. He is significantly taller than her but taking purposefully shorter strides to match her pace. “I wouldn’t have told anyone, you know.”

Tammy shakes her head. “I couldn’t. There’s a whole law about it,” she explains. After she got her Hogwarts letter, she wanted desperately to be able to tell someone. It’s a lot to ask of a child, to keep something so exciting from all of her Muggle friends. “The International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy. It’s been in place since the late seventeenth century. It’s a big issue. Remember witch hunts? Those _happened._ We have to be careful about what we do and say and wear and talk about around people. We could only tell you now because we were going to be living with you, and we had to fill out a ton of forms to even get it approved.”

Michael nods, thoughtful. “So how does it… work? Your mum isn’t – one, right? Was your dad…?”

“No. No, he wasn’t. He loved it, though. He wanted to know every little thing I could tell him.” Sidestepping to the right, she guides them around another corner. “It must have been really far back in our bloodline. I guess sometimes the gene for it just goes dormant for years, maybe even centuries. They had to send someone from the school to explain it all.” She tells him bits and pieces of the story, about the way all the colour drained out of her mum’s face at first, a little about Diagon Alley and how long her dad spent moving up and down each row of shelves in every shop the summer before her first year at Hogwarts. She tells him about Quidditch and how it feels to take a broomstick up to the goalposts. She’s probably not supposed to give him this much information, but he solemnly mimes crossing his heart and it feels _good_ to talk to him more freely like this.

She only falls silent when they reach the old house, and they stand in front of it on the sidewalk for a few minutes while she lets her sightline sweep over every detail. The people here now have painted over the front door in a bright, clear white, and planted tulips along the edge of the path up to it. It looks nice, but Tammy doesn’t think she likes it. If she comes back here again, will they have changed more? What will it feel like when every last trace of the home she knew is gone forever?

Michael doesn’t seem particularly surprised to be here. He stands still like a statue, waiting patiently until she is ready to turn back and start walking again. When she does, he falls in next to her again and matches her step for step, the whole way back. 

Her steps slow a little as they get closer and closer, and maybe he can sense a little of the dread, because he breaks the comfortable quiet to say, “I know my mum’s been a little off with you. The rest of my family kind of just takes their cues from her. Give them a little time, okay? It’s a big curveball.”

Tammy smiles wistfully. “Your mum hasn’t liked me much for a lot longer than that, Michael,” she points out. As he opens his mouth to reply, she shakes her head and adds, “It’s fine. She doesn’t have to. I’m just glad you don’t hate me anymore. I can handle the rest.”

He tugs on her ponytail like he used to when they were little kids. “I never hated you, Tam.”

Linking her elbow with his, Tammy locks them this way by lacing her fingers together inside the too-long sleeves of her dad’s hoodie. “Okay,” she says softly. They walk like that all the way until they reach his house. His, because it still doesn’t feel like hers. It feels a little more welcoming now, though. She just hopes that doesn’t evaporate entirely once she goes back to Hogwarts again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> michael is the only member of nadine's family we claim. my headcanon is that in canon, he would have been tammy's husband, so there's that. anyway, i would love to hear your thoughts in any comments you might have half-formed in your head! they fuel my soul. i'll see you guys next chapter, when danny annihilates debbie at wizard chess, school starts up again, and something potentially dramatic happens.


	17. Chapter 17

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> there is something off here, and debbie cannot quite put her finger on it. is it more than just lou knowing that she’s lying about something? she hovers on the edge of asking for the whole train ride back to hogwarts, glancing at her friend when she’s not looking, and winds up keeping her mouth firmly shut. she can’t comprehend why lou would feel like telling her anything when there are secrets on her side, too. maybe she loves tammy – won’t ever get over that, being able to string those words together – but there’s no denying that their relationship represents a wall that has cropped up in between debbie and lou. not quite impenetrable, but almost. she doesn’t think something like this has ever existed when it comes to lou before. they have always been able to tell each other almost anything. only once she started getting close to tammy, somehow, things have changed. she never intended for tammy to dismantle her connection with lou. that was never the plan.

Debbie sleeps mostly on the couch at Danny’s flat for the last few days of Easter break. She isn’t asked to and doesn’t ask permission, but it’s something unspoken that everyone just goes along with. She drifts off there by accident the first night after Danny is released from St Mungo’s, wakes up in the morning to dishes clinking together in the kitchen. “Morning, sleepyhead,” says Tess, smiling at her from the counter. “I’m thinking either pancakes or waffles, what do you think?”

She stays all day and, while she’s sure that Tess would get her home in five seconds by side-along Apparition if she asked, neither her brother or his girlfriend bring it up. Their flat is a lot smaller than the big, empty house, and maybe they don’t want to leave her alone there again. At ten o’clock, Tess quietly sets a pillow and blanket at one end of the couch, and a brand-new toothbrush by the bathroom sink, and that’s that.

On Tuesday, Tess goes back to work. Debbie sticks around to entertain Danny as he complains endlessly about not being cleared for work again yet. Distracting him proves difficult mostly because he’s no longer confined to bed rest, and by the time lunch rolls around, he’s already practically bouncing off the walls. “I’m  _ bored,” _ he groans, like a small child, until she agrees to let him annihilate her in a game of wizard’s chess. He manages this easily, could probably do so with his hands tied behind his back. “Chess is a game of  _ strategy,  _ Deb,” he says loftily, after the first checkmate. “You’ve got to think five steps ahead.”

“Teach me, then,” says Debbie, eyes already lighting up with the challenge. “I could be really good at strategy, you know. Maybe I just need guidance from the right person.”

And this actually works – Danny enthusiastically spends the rest of the afternoon trying to impart all his chess-related wisdom upon her, and it keeps him occupied, focused. His method of teaching mostly involves him beating her, explaining how he did it and what mistakes she made to let him, resetting the board, and beating her again. But as they progress, she does get better, feeling immensely pleased with herself each time she survives a little longer.

She’s the one who grows bored of this in the end; there are only so many times she can hear  _ checkmate  _ before getting entirely too frustrated to carry on. She lies back on the floor to look at the ceiling, just like they did at Christmas but without a tree set up over her head. Danny follows suit, so they are both lying on his living room floor with a chess board in between them, and neither of them talk, for a while. She thinks about his life: The Auror job and how quickly and successfully he’s moved through training, the way he carried himself through last summer after their mother died, the flat and Tess and the easy, effortless fashion in which things always seem to come to him. “Is that just how you do everything?” she asks.

“Hmm?” Danny turns his head sharply to look at her, frowning.

She waves her hands in the air as if it will help illustrate her point. “Strategy. Thinking five steps ahead. It just… always seems like stuff is easy for you. Is that how?”

He shrugs. “Sometimes. It’s not all easy,” he admits. “You can’t plan for everything, Deb. That isn’t how life works. If it did, it’d be boring.”

— • —

At King’s Cross, Lou pushes through the crowd of students and parents to get to Debbie, her mother and father following several paces behind. She looks exhausted, the way she always does when she’s spent more time than she’d like to socializing with her family. “You’re a sight for sore eyes,” she declares grandly, grinning but not moving her bangs aside. Even with the way they partially obscure her eyes from view, Debbie can see the key differences between this smile and a real one. Lou meets Danny’s eyes over her shoulder. “Glad you’re okay, man. You get any cool scars?”

“They healed them all right off,” answers Danny, deadpan. He crosses his arms then, adding, “You know, I’m a little offended you didn’t come to see me.”

Lou rolls her eyes. “I was on a whole other continent, Danny.” She’s good-natured about it, falls right into the easy banter she and Danny have always had, but when they’ve maneuvered their trunks up onto the train and are out of his earshot, she turns to Debbie with a frown. “I thought your letter said he couldn’t have any visitors besides family.”

Guiltily, Debbie adjusts her grip on the handle of Lilith’s cage. Because she  _ did _ write that, when she wrote to each of her friends to tell them what happened, and  _ technically _ it’s true. But if they had come, she could have gotten them past the nurse’s station with no real trouble, the way she did when Tammy got there. “Oh, you know Danny. He’s just being dramatic,” she tries.

Narrowing her eyes, Lou holds eye contact for longer than is really necessary. Debbie doesn’t know why she keeps lying to the other girl – her  _ best friend, _ the platonic soulmate who knows her better than anyone else, or at least ties with Tammy by this point. The person who knows whatever tell she has that  _ she _ can’t even pick up on, who knows without a doubt when Debbie’s lying, no matter how hard she tries. She has a million things she wants to tell Lou, and she thought telling Danny and Tess would mean a little bit of a reprieve from feeling weighed down by her own secrets, but being around others again only reminds her that there are so many more people who she  _ could _ tell. She wants to talk to Lou about all of it. Okay,  _ almost _ all of it. Maybe she could tell just a little bit, leave out Tammy’s name. Maybe that would be enough.

But Lou sets her mouth in a thin, straight lines and her eyes are a stormy sort of blue, a look Debbie isn’t so familiar with because it’s not typically directed at  _ her. _ “Let’s go find the others,” she decides, spinning away. “I saw Nine-Ball that way.”

There is something  _ off _ here, and Debbie cannot quite put her finger on it. Is it more than just Lou knowing that she’s lying about something? She hovers on the edge of asking for the whole train ride back to Hogwarts, glancing at her friend when she’s not looking, and winds up keeping her mouth firmly shut. She can’t comprehend why Lou would feel like telling her anything when there are secrets on her side, too. Maybe she loves Tammy – won’t ever get over that, being able to string those words together, she is  _ in love with  _ Tammy Prescott – but there’s no denying that their relationship represents a wall that has cropped up in between Debbie and Lou. Not quite impenetrable, but almost. She doesn’t think something like this has ever existed when it comes to Lou before. They have always been able to tell each other almost anything. Only once she started getting close to Tammy, realizing that there are a few things that she can talk to her about that she  _ can’t  _ with Lou, somehow, things have changed. She never intended for adding Tammy to her list of confidants to dismantle her connection with Lou. That was never the plan.

They are good at faking it, though, all of them. Constance and Nine-Ball, yes, but Debbie and Lou, especially. On the surface, everything rolls forward just as smoothly as it has for the past several years. It’s only once they look a little closer that they can see the cracks forming in the very foundation they all built together back in first year. Or is Debbie the only one who feels that?

“I want to tell them. Lou, at least,” she confesses on the astronomy tower, thumb moving slowly across the back of Tammy’s hand. She’s quiet about it, thoughtful, certain and uncertain all at once. “It feels… wrong, to keep all these secrets from them. I’m supposed to be able to tell my best friends anything, right? I-I just don’t know how. Maybe it would be easier if they already knew that I’m bisexual. But I don’t even know how to tell them  _ that.” _ She has only said it aloud a handful of times now, could count the instances on the fingers of one hand, and she feels a little more secure in it each time. Telling her friends, though, feels  _ big. _ If it were just that, or just telling them about Tammy, it might be okay.  _ Both _ is simply overwhelming. The rest of the school, she knows which part she is worried about; but with her friends, it’s all mixed up. “I think they’d be okay with it. I just don’t want that to be affected by…”

“By me,” Tammy finishes for her. She says it simply, no hurt laced into the words. Sounds maybe a little tired, and that’s it. Maybe they’re okay, but Debbie’s indecision on this matter is affecting her, too. She feels like she’s slipping under water, arms and legs flailing to try and keep herself afloat, offering every opportunity to hurt everyone she cares about. Tammy and Lou and Nine-Ball and Constance. The only ones really safe from her now are Danny and Tess. “If you want to tell them, I’m with you. If you don’t, I’m with you, anyway. You just need to be sure. Look at me for a second, okay?” She presses her free hand over Debbie’s and waits until Debbie looks up, meets her eyes very seriously. “If you tell them, and they have a problem with me, that’s fine. It’s tricky, with the Lou and Daphne thing. If that’s the part they have an issue with, it’s okay. But if it’s the other part… Debbie, that’s just you being  _ yourself. _ Real friends are going to get it. Especially yours.”

Debbie tears her gaze away at the implication she hears between the lines. “They  _ are  _ real friends.” She can feel herself closing up already, doesn’t like feeling like this with Tammy, of all people.

Tammy’s cool fingers slide over her cheek to bring her back, however reluctantly Debbie goes along with it. “I know they are. That’s what I’m saying,” she says. “I’m saying if you’re ready to tell them, they’re going to be ready to listen. And if the only thing they can’t get past is that it’s me, then that’s okay.” 

_ Oh. _ The low, angry buzz building in her chest evaporates into steam. Tammy’s words always have a way of calming her down, she has learned. She sighs, though. “I want them to like you,” she admits, in the smallest whisper. The ease with which Tammy fit in at the hospital with Danny and Tess, she wants it to extend to her friends. She just doesn’t see how that’s possible. She kisses Tammy, soft and slow, tangles her fingers in her blonde hair to pull her as close as she can, and tries to pour the meaning of the words into every touch. It makes her heart pound, her breath catch, the way it does every time. Maybe her body will never get used to being able to do this. Time stands still until she pulls back, forehead still pressed to the other girl’s, so all the air between them is shared, and she lets her hands move down to Tammy’s shoulders. “I love you,” she says out loud. The only other time she’s said it is the  _ first _ time. “You know that?”

The answering smile she gets is brilliant, stretching across Tammy’s face so her eyes light up, teeth flashing in the dark. “I know. I love you, too. You know that?” she asks back. Debbie’s heart skips a beat, and she can only manage to nod. Lips brush feather-light over hers, over her cheek and the tip of her nose and her jawline. “You’re something else, Debbie Ocean.”

— • —

She is going to tell them. 

She will not do this all at once, she decides; she’ll start with Lou, and then Nine-Ball, and then Constance last because she’s particularly bad at keeping secrets. She feels more secure in this decision than she ever did before Easter – and yet, still, it is something she can’t seem to figure out how to build herself up to. She spends most days promising herself she is going to just say it, out of the blue. She’ll say it when Lou gets back from Quidditch practice. Or she’ll say it in the library, after dinner. Or she’ll say it when Lou comes around that corner after class. But every time she actually meets her friend’s eyes and readies herself to speak, the words simply don’t come out. Her heart beats too fast and her palms sweat a bit and she shoves her hands into the pockets of her robes and shuts her mouth, instead. Time slips forward, one day at a time, and still, she doesn’t spill her secrets.

She doesn’t understand  _ why. _ She’s ready now, isn’t she? Or at least, she feels like she is. This sentiment is scrawled in a letter to Danny, practically in code so that if one of her friends reads it over her shoulder, they won’t be able to really figure it out.  _ Maybe you’re not as ready as you think you are, _ he writes back, and it’s supposed to come across as reassuring, she thinks, but it doesn’t quite manage it.

April gives way into May and the weather begins to grow warmer again. It’s been nearly a full year now since the first night she climbed the stairs up to the astronomy tower and found Tammy Prescott sitting there. Almost a year and everything has changed. Even as she practices forming the words silently on her tongue to tell Lou about it, every phrasing sounds wrong.

Tammy traces words into her skin, over her shoulder, in the middle of the night. “I’m worried about my friends, too,” she admits, something she hasn’t said aloud before. It’s always been focused in on Debbie’s friends, especially Lou, and Debbie guiltily realizes now that she’s neglected to think of the other side much at all. “Not Amita and Rose, really. Mostly just Daphne. With Lou, it’s that she doesn’t like my friends, even if she doesn’t really… know me, personally. But with Daphne, it’s – different. Because her main issue is Lou, but she’s, you know, not your biggest fan, either.”

Rolling her eyes, Debbie brushes blonde hair back and tucks it carefully behind the other girl’s ear. Her hair is braided back but it’s the end of the day, so to speak, and it’s all starting to slip out of the way it’s tied. “I can handle Daphne Kluger,” she answers, holding her chin up high. But she softens after that. “It’s going to be okay. Real friends are going to get it,” she echoes Tammy’s words from before.

With a little sigh, Tammy nods. “Yeah. Who knows? Maybe they’ll work it out.”

“I wouldn’t hold your breath,” mumbles Debbie. She leans forward, kisses the other girl, careful and unhurried. Pulls away just enough to breathe in and then her mouth is entirely occupied again, and when Tammy’s fingers work themselves into her hair, she shifts to move her lips lower, ears filled with the contented sigh that escapes the girl as she reaches her collarbone.

After that, all thoughts of their respective friends’ possible disapproval floods out of her head altogether. All she can think of is Tammy.

— • —

There is another Hogsmeade trip in mid-May, and it takes too long to find a moment to sneak away. Debbie glances  anxiously at the clock in every shop they step into, watching as the hands draw closer and closer to the time she is supposed to meet Tammy. And then five minutes past, and then ten, and then fifteen. 

She ends up ducking out of Honeydukes without saying anything at all to her friends, counting only on the cover of the crowds of Hogwarts students milling around the candy store. She glances over her shoulder twice before she turns the corner, to make sure nobody is coming after her. Constance can spend hours in Honeydukes, if they let her. She can only assume that Nine-Ball and Lou will be preoccupied by the smaller girl, and that will give her a little time to see Tammy and then pop back up; maybe they’ll hardly even realize she’s gone.

Maybe she will talk to Lou tonight.

Debbie reaches the alley by the Hog’s Head, rounding the corner so suddenly that the first thing she sees is Tammy’s eyes gone wide, startled. “Hey,” she says in greeting, watching her girlfriend relax. “Sorry. It took me a bit to get away.” She steps forward so that Tammy’s shoulders press right up to the wall, laces their fingers together smoothly. Tammy’s hair falls in loose curls today, slowly becoming undone by the rain that began to fall as the student body made its way down into the village, and she tugs lightly on one of them with her other hand before kissing her. “I can’t stay too long, but I wanted to see you,” she whispers into the minuscule amount of space between them. Tammy maneuvers her hands up, skims them up over her sides and her shoulders to curl all her fingers into her dark hair and pull Debbie in again.

As always, everything melts away when she’s touching Tammy like this. Everything except the sharp intake of breath somewhere to her left.

She spins, to the best of her ability with Tammy’s hands still where they are, and it feels as if everything freezes. Because there’s  _ Lou, _ several feet away down the alley but close enough that she can see this clearly: Debbie and Tammy and just how Debbie’s left knee has made its way in between both of Tammy’s, and the way her hands have slipped inside the light rain jacket Tammy wears just to press in closer to her. There’s Lou, blue eyes wide, mouth open, looking rather as if she might explode.

Debbie blinks rapidly, mind racing. “Lou?” she manages. The name comes out hushed. She should pinch herself, just to see if this is real, or if it’s just a nightmare. She wants the ground to simply open up beneath her and swallow her whole.

The blonde takes a step backwards. “Unbelievable,” she says coolly, and turns on her heel  to go. 

Time finally unsticks when Lou’s back is turned. She should go after her. Every step she watches Lou take feels like a loss. Hanging back, she brushes a piece of Tammy’s hair away from her eyes. “I’m sorry, I have to go,” she whispers. 

Tammy nods, untangles herself and pushes at Debbie’s hips with both hands to create the beginnings of distance there. “It’s okay. Go.”

The Slytherin girl has already disappeared around the corner into the street when Debbie manages to begin moving. She’s going too slowly, feet dragging a little as she half-jogs to catch up. Predictably, the skies open up a little more now, as if it’s not nearly summer. Ahead of them, the students wandering the cobbled street begin to duck into the Hog’s Head and the surrounding shops. 

“Lou,” she calls, gaining on the girl. Maybe she  _ is _ moving faster than she thought. “Lou, wait! I-I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I was going to, I swear –”

Lou doesn’t stop. “When?”

“Tonight,” Debbie tries, but even with Lou’s back turned, she can tell she’s rolling her eyes. She’s close now, only a couple feet behind the other girl, but Lou has long legs and the power of her anger propelling her forward, and she still has to take a couple steps for each of Lou’s to keep up. Hurriedly, she amends, “Or tomorrow.  _ Soon.” _

“Sure,” says Lou skeptically. Like she knows, just as well as Debbie does, that she was probably going to put it off still longer. She stops abruptly now, spinning to face Debbie, who stumbles to avoid running right into her. “Tonight, or tomorrow,” she repeats, “and just how long has  _ that _ been going on?”

Faltering, Debbie tries not to break eye contact. That’s a tell, even if she isn’t sure if it’s the one Lou has picked out about her. She wants to be clear, now, no more lying. “A – a while.”

Lou snorts. “Of course it has. That’s the thing you’ve been lying to me about for months, right?”

She’s perceptive, always has been. It’s something Debbie has known since the very beginning, and she’s been taking advantage of every little distraction all year, thinking that will be enough. “I was just – trying to figure everything out,” she tries to explain. It’s not enough, she knows already. “I wasn’t ready to tell  _ anyone  _ yet. I only  _ just _ told Danny and I… I was going to tell you next.” Her heart is hammering away in her chest. This whole time, she has been putting off telling Lou, and now it’s not happening in at all the way she’s been trying to imagine it. “I was… afraid. Of how you were going to react.”

“What, because it’s a _ her?” _ Lou spreads her arms exasperatedly and speaks too loudly, either doesn’t notice the little answering flinch or doesn’t care. She gets wrapped up in herself when she’s upset, doesn’t catch little details like that sometimes. Debbie just isn’t used to being on the receiving end. “I’m  _ gay,  _ Debbie! You think I give a shit whether you’re into girls?”

She wills herself not to steal a glance around to check whether anyone has heard, but they are at the quieter end of the village, and the rain seems to have sent everyone else in search of shelter. It trails down through her hair to soak into her sweater; she’s not prepared with a rain jacket like Tammy. She’s not ready for everyone to know, not yet. And there is nobody around to hear, but there is a tightness in her chest that even that fact doesn’t release. Something that has nothing to do with strangers among the student body and everything to do with the way Lou is looking at her as if she doesn’t know her at all.

“No, that’s not – that’s not what I was worried about for you. That was for me.  _ I _ wasn’t ready to tell anyone that. I-I’m getting there.” She fumbles through her explanation, trying to get the words out too quickly, like that is going to help douse the fire in Lou’s eyes. It doesn’t do much for that, really – just makes it feel as if each syllable is tripping over the next one. “I just – I thought you hated her. Specifically. Tammy. Be-because of Daphne.”

Something hardens in Lou’s face. 

“I’m supposed to be your  _ best friend, _ Deb. We’re supposed to tell each other everything,” and oh, every word she’s saying is right, and it’s not as if if the reality of lying to her best friend for months hasn’t set in just yet, but the fallout makes it a thousand times heavier. Lou looks at her closely. “Are you in love with her?” she asks, with that patented Lou Miller tone, the one she takes when she already knows the answer and only wants to be proven right.

Hesitantly, Debbie nods, and Lou mirrors her. She watches the blonde throughout this movement, the cold, decisive nature of it. “So you’ve been lying to me for months because you thought, what, I wouldn’t be happy for you? You think I’m that shitty of a friend, that I couldn’t get over who her  _ friends _ are?  _ That’s  _ why I’m pissed.” She narrows her eyes at Debbie and says, very firmly, “Don’t follow me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...i'm sorry.
> 
> if you need to yell at me for this, you can do so in the comments or on twitter – @deboceans – and i will just let u do it. i won't even fight back. i hate myself, too.
> 
> if you're not too mad at me, see you next chapter, when debbie and tammy try to deal with the fallout from ...this, daphne has dialogue that isn't just ranting about lou, and tammy comes up with a plan. of sorts.


	18. Chapter 18

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “lou’s the most stubborn person i know,” she points out. there’s a joke in there somewhere – more stubborn than you? – but tammy thinks it would fall flat, so she lets it slide. “nobody can make her do something she doesn’t want to do.” maybe tammy shouldn’t take that as a challenge.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well, the end of that last chapter was kind of rough, wasn't it? but some things are getting put out in the open now, so let's see how this one plays out.

When she reaches the top of the stairs, Debbie is already there. The rain has stopped, and her sweater is pulled tight around her even though the weather has been turning warmer again. She doesn’t turn to look when Tammy steps out into the open, and it’s only after Tammy sits down next to her that she speaks softly. 

“Lou hasn’t talked to me in three days.”

She has seen this; it’s not something easy to miss. She has seen Debbie sitting alone at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall, and she has seen the way that Lou’s shoulders angle away from her in class. There is no mistaking it for coincidence.

The rest of the Hogsmeade trip blurred into a mess so that Tammy can only pick out certain tiny details. Debbie’s retreating form down the street when she finally gathered the strength to emerge from the alley, too far off to even think about catching up. Her own friends being so preoccupied with other things to pick up on the steep drop to Tammy’s mood (not that she wanted to talk about it, anyway). At dinner, she saw Debbie take a step in her friends’ direction and then stop short at a tiny shake of Lou’s head. Tammy’s anger about this feels like fire burning through each one of her veins. She wanted Debbie to have only good experiences attached to this, wanted that so desperately for her. She thought that Lou would understand, truly – Lou who she’s seen with her arm slung around a girl’s shoulders here and a girl’s waist there, Lou who has been on Debbie’s side since they were practically toddlers – that the only real obstacle would be Tammy herself. Maybe she didn’t imagine putting herself in Lou’s shoes for long enough to think seriously about how there’s another factor: The length of time Debbie has been going out of her way to keep her in the dark. Maybe she didn’t think about it long enough to acknowledge that Nine-Ball and Constance would, in all likelihood, stick to Lou’s side like glue because they’ve been lied to, too. Usually, Tammy is good at that. Considering the feelings of everyone around her. Perhaps she’s simply been too focused on Debbie to look at anyone else.

And now here they are, and Debbie has gone hollow and sad, and she’s afraid this is the sort of loss she can’t handle, on top of everything. She is still reeling after losing her mother in the summer, and has only just managed to figure out how to keep a hold on her relationship with her brother, and now she is effectively on her own. It’s not that Tammy blames Debbie’s friends for their reactions; it’s just that she is close enough to see the effect. There is a selfish part of her that is only terrified of losing Debbie entirely, of the other girl picking up and running after Lou and leaving Tammy behind. She tries to push that mental image into the depths of her head.

She leans her head on Debbie’s shoulder, reaches to lace their fingers together. “I can’t remember ever  _ not  _ being friends with her,” says Debbie, in that blank, numb sort of way that Tammy is worried will never entirely go away. “She’s been there forever. We’ve never fought about anything, ever.”

She doesn’t cry. She is not a crier. Tammy is the one the tears come to, and they are starting to spring up now, with no real reason to. One rolls and falls and hits the back of Debbie’s hand, and this is not supposed to be about her comforting Tammy, that’s the opposite of her intentions, but Debbie moves her shoulder to nudge Tammy back up and kisses each one away, anyway. “I’m sorry, I don’t know why I’m…” she mumbles with a watery laugh, smoothing her palms over Debbie’s shoulders. Hesitantly, she pulls back, sliding her hands down to Debbie’s to stop them from moving. “Should we… should we stop?”

There it is, a way out offered to the dark-haired girl, a door or a window or an escape hatch if she wants it. Tammy braces herself for the answer. It’s not as if she doesn’t know how important Lou and Nine-Ball and Constance are to Debbie. They are her found family, the ones she’s spent her entire adolescence around – and for Lou, even more. Maybe she and Debbie have jumped headlong into learning all about each other, inside and out, but it has been hardly any time at all. Compare one year to six, and the scales are clearly tipped one way every time.

But Debbie shakes her head quickly. “No. I don’t think I could ever be just your friend again.”

And it isn’t what Tammy meant, really, because she meant  _ stop,  _ altogether. Still, a wave of relief weeps over her at Debbie’s answer. That she doesn’t want to stop. That even if she did, there isn’t a question in her mind of whether they would still be friends. That at least part of this connection they have is non-negotiable.  _ I don’t think I could ever be just your friend again. _

She wraps her arms tight around Debbie’s shoulders, pulls her in close, presses her face into her dark hair so everything she inhales is Debbie. “I love you, no matter what,” she says, muffled, but it’s enough. She feels Debbie move to hold onto her, arms circling her waist, fingers brushing over her lower back in the space between the waistband of the jeans and the thin T-shirt she wears. “You know, you’re as important to Lou as she is to you.” She wants to say more, that she thinks Lou will start speaking to her again soon, that she can’t imagine the Slytherin girl simply leaving Debbie in the dust without a word, only she doesn’t want to get her hopes up. After all, she underestimated Lou’s reaction to  _ this. _ Tammy likes to think she’s good at reading people, but Lou Miller is an enigma. Mysterious, difficult to understand, full of surprises. She likes to keep people on their toes.

Every muscle in Debbie’s body seems to tense, one by one, but she doesn’t let go. “Lou’s the most stubborn person I know,” she points out. There’s a joke in there somewhere –  _ more stubborn than you?  _ – but Tammy thinks it would fall flat, so she lets it slide. “Nobody can make her do something she doesn’t want to do.”

Maybe Tammy shouldn’t take that as a challenge.

— • —

Debbie says she should tell her friends. 

“If you want, I mean,” she adds, displaying one of those rare moments of uncertainty that Tammy always feels a little privileged to be allowed to see. “You don’t have to. I just figured, you know, it’s out now, right?”

It’s not the way Tammy has imagined it, but she feels lighter than air, anyway. This is combated by the very real fear that her friends will react in a similar way to Debbie’s. But there is no alley in Hogsmeade for them to stumble upon the secret before she can tell them, and the secret isn’t really multiple secrets rolled up into one. She splits them up, conquers the conversation one person at a time. Amita is over the moon. Rose is pleased, too, even goes so far as to clap her hands while a bright smile spreads across her face. This is predictable; she wants, more than anything, for the people she cares about to be happy, and all the details don’t matter. She thinks big-picture, always has.

Daphne is the one she’s most worried about.

They go for a walk skirting the edge of the lake, just before the weather gets nice enough that the rest of the student body begins to spend their free time outdoors. “I have to tell you something,” she starts, nervous energy humming in all of her bones.

“No shit. We hardly ever spend time together, like, one-on-one anymore, you ever notice that?” Daphne links her arm through Tammy’s to keep her from losing her balance. Sometimes, Tammy wonders how much of Daphne is hidden away beneath the surface. She is a pureblood, like Debbie and Lou, coming from old wizarding money, and no doubt experiences similar pressures to the ones they do. Debbie has told her about the knot of families like that, how she’s known Daphne since they were both very small. She’s seen the way Daphne’s parents’ smiles tighten when they speak to her, or to Amita. Still, her friend’s attitude toward her has never been negative. She is a leader through and through, took both of them under her wing from the get-go. Even Rose, later, when they started dating. Daphne looks out for each one of them, eyes like a hawk, ready to raise her wand to protect any of them at a moment’s notice.

“Before I say it, I need you to promise me two things. One, you can’t tell anyone. Rose and Amita, that’s it.” She holds up her fingers to count the conditions off. This first one is important; Debbie asked for it. For it to be their friends, first, and not anybody else. She waits for Daphne to nod her confirmation, sleek brown ponytail bouncing around her shoulders, before carrying on. “Two, you have to swear you’ll try not to absolutely lose your mind when I tell you.” Another nod, and she takes a deep breath, and begins. Tells Daphne everything, almost: That she’s been dating someone, and that it’s all been in secret, and that it’s been going on since before Christmas. For her part, Daphne remains quiet the whole way through. She’s a good listener, when she tries to be. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner,” she finishes, and falls silent.

“I don’t get it,” she says with a frown. They’ve sat down now, on a large, flat rock on the opposite side of the lake from the castle, and she’s got her elbows propped on her knees so she can tap her fingernails thoughtfully at her cheek. “Why the second thing? Why am I supposed to be losing my mind?”

“You’re supposed to be  _ not _ losing your mind,” Tammy reminds her. She looks out, across the lake, trails her gaze over the silhouette of the castle. The astronomy tower rises above everything else, and it brings a soft smile to her face. “Um, because it’s… it’s Debbie Ocean.”

There’s a long pause, and she’s afraid to look back at her friend. This is the moment that’s going to make or break the whole thing, she thinks. If Daphne can get past the girl Tammy’s got feelings for being Debbie, then maybe Lou can, too.

Daphne bumps shoulders with her and gives a long-suffering sigh. “Merlin. At least it’s not Miller,” she says, and when Tammy turns to look back at her, she raises both hands in mock surrender. “Relax, I’m kidding.” But something lights up in her eyes, and the next thing she asks is, “Wait, does Miller know?”

“Do  _ not,” _ replies Tammy, warning notes ringing from the words. She twists to place one hand on each of Daphne’s shoulders and looks at her as seriously as she can. “She knows, and she’s not exactly happy about it. Don’t make it worse. Please. For me?” She waits for a nod again. Doesn’t get a verbal agreement, but this will have to be enough. She releases the other girl and looks at her apprehensively. “Are you really okay with this? I… With it being Debbie?”

Shrugging, Daphne swings her legs to one side to stand up. “Listen, you know that’s all… complicated. I don’t exactly love her, I’m not gonna lie. But I guess I don’t know her the way you do.” She holds out both hands for Tammy’s and pulls her up to her feet, too. She stands a couple inches taller than Tammy does, and keeps a tight grip around her fingers for an extra moment. “What I think doesn’t matter. What’s important is that  _ you’re  _ happy.”

“I’m happy.”

The other girl smiles, signature dimples around the corners of her mouth. “Good. Then I’m in.” She links arms with Tammy again, muttering about how disaster-prone she is anywhere but a Quidditch pitch, and they carry on around the lake to loop back towards the castle.

She feels a little bad, after. That it’s all gone so well, when Debbie’s friends still aren’t giving in. Nine-Ball and Constance are in on it now, though she has no idea whether they got the news from Debbie or from Lou. She thinks Constance must be speaking to her, at least a little – the girl is as talkative as Amita half the time and sleeps in the bed next to Debbie’s, and probably couldn’t hold a grudge against someone so important to her for longer than a couple days, anyway.

Nine-Ball is the reason Tammy discovers that they know. She’s painting her toenails on the dormitory floor when Tammy emerges from the bathroom, the evening after she talks to Daphne, and her eyes flash up to lock on Tammy’s with an intensity that stops her in her tracks. “So you’re not gonna hurt her, huh?” she asks, deadpan, and there’s no question who she means.

“No,” says Tammy, very quietly. “I’m not, I hope.”

They stay like that, Nine-Ball on the floor with her foot propped up on her charms textbook, and Tammy frozen in the doorway, and Nine-Ball sizes her up until she breaks and nods. “Okay,” she says, and that’s it.

— • —

Tammy waits outside the change rooms for Lou, arms crossed over her chest, and marches up to her bravely when she steps out into the open. The other girl stops in her tracks when she sees Tammy coming, eyes flickering to both sides like she’s searching for an escape route.  _ Lou’s the most stubborn person I know, _ Debbie’s voice echoes in her head.  _ Nobody can make her do something she doesn’t want to do. _ But she’s been waiting for the right moment to approach, gathering up all her courage. 

“Can we talk?”

She stands as still as she can while Lou’s eyes sweep over her from head to toe, feeling incredibly exposed. Really, she doesn’t think she’s ever spoken to Lou Miller one-on-one before in her life. “I’m busy,” she says shortly, and sidesteps right around her, shoulders brushing as she passes.

Over the next couple of days, though, Tammy pops up everywhere. She waits outside classrooms, she hovers in the corridor to the Slytherin dungeons, she approaches her table in the library.  _ Can we talk? _ she asks, over and over.  _ How about now? _ And eventually, Lou has to give in. “Fine,” she sighs, and leads the way into an empty classroom, where she leans on a desk with one eyebrow arched and waits for Tammy to say her piece.

Only she has spent so much time trying to corner Lou to talk to her, she hasn’t put nearly enough thought into what, exactly, she’s going to say when she does. Tammy sighs, inhales again, tries to look as confident as possible. “You should talk to Debbie.”

Lou blinks slowly. “Why?”

_ You’re her best friend, _ Tammy wants to snap, but that won’t help.

She leans back against the closed door, trying to appear every bit as casual as Lou does right now. “It’s like there’s this… hole in her,” she attempts to explain, waving her hands to illustrate her point. “Like every time she moves, a part of her might fall in. I… I can’t fill that void for her. She’s too stubborn to do anything about it, but she misses  _ you. _ And Constance and Nine-Ball. And I know you miss her, too.”

It’s as if Lou has turned to stone; she’s not moving, appears to maybe even be holding her breath. Maybe this is a technique she uses to keep a hold on that mystery she likes people to see when they look at her. This close up, though, Tammy thinks she can get a little more. She can tell that Lou feels like she’s missing something without Debbie, too – like they’re two pieces of a whole, broken apart with jagged edges. She turns to go, plans to leave it at that. All she wanted was to get that piece out, just enough to get it into the Slytherin girl’s head. She and Debbie are both stubborn as hell, and it’s obvious enough that they’ve got one of those friendships that’s written in the stars, even if neither of them want to make a move to reach for it again. Maybe they just need a tiny push. 

When she’s got her hand on the doorknob, though, Lou speaks, and Tammy pauses to listen. “Did she ask you to talk to me?”

“I – no. She doesn’t know I’m here,” admits Tammy, turning slowly back. Lou is unchanged, watching her solemnly with that one eyebrow still raised. She straightens her spine and squares her shoulders under the blonde’s cool blue gaze. “I know you don’t like me, Lou,” she says simply, meeting her eyes and allowing a still calm to possess her. She feels more collected than ever, like she has grown into a part of herself she didn’t quite realize was there. “You don’t have to; I can handle that just fine. I’m in love with her, though. Have been for a while. I don’t like seeing her like this, and I can’t just sit back and watch it all unfold. You miss her, and she misses you. What’s more important than that?”

Eying her curiously, Lou shrugs, puts her hands in her pockets. “She’s been lying to me,  _ and _ Constance,  _ and _ Nine-Ball, for months,” she remarks. Tammy crosses her fingers in her own pocket, out of sight. She can see the other girl’s shoulders lowering, a little of the tension lifted away. She doesn’t sound quite so angry anymore, just sort of sad, hurt. “She’s supposed to be able to tell me anything. Trust is something that’s important to me.”

Uncrossing her fingers, Tammy raises her hands up into the open in a gesture of surrender. “I know. I wouldn’t have wanted it like this, but you and I both know how stubborn she is. She’s been dealing with a lot, Lou. With her mum, and with – with me, and Danny, and on top of all that, she’s just been trying to figure out how to be comfortable with who she is.” She’s getting through, she  _ thinks. _ There is something in Lou that is beginning to soften, slow bit by slow bit. She forges on, “You don’t have to forgive her just yet. I just think you should talk to her. Get things out in the open, hear each other’s perspectives a little. If there’s anyone who can work through this, it’s probably the two of you.”

She has said all the words she’s got now, and she nods decisively before reaching for the doorknob again. This time, Lou lets her go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> comments, kudos, general feedback is always appreciated! and you can follow me on twitter @deboceans. if you want.


	19. Chapter 19

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the loneliness is something that takes longer than she thought to grow accustomed to. debbie feels mostly as if she's going through the motions, and it is terrifyingly similar to the numbness she felt at the beginning of the school year. the quidditch season wraps up – slytherin takes the cup, because daphne, for all her faults and for all the drama with lou, runs a tight ship and has guided them through a solid season – and she doesn’t get to sit next to lou and listen to her grudgingly agree to that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aaannnddd we're back! this chapter is one of my favourites because, listen, everything sucks (re: the last couple of chapters' events, lol), but there are two big and important things to talk about here, and i hope they feel as overwhelmingly satisfying to you as they start to happen as they did for me when the words started flowing out. and we're officially _so, so close_ to the end! which is crazy, because this fic has been pretty much engulfing my entire life for months. honestly, i don't know what i'm going to do without it, but i hope it will be okay – because i have a ton of other new and exciting fics planned! one shots? two shots? multi chapters? there's a whole bunch of things in the works, and i'm excited!

The loneliness is something that takes longer than she thought to grow accustomed to. Debbie feels mostly as if she’s going through the motions, and it is terrifyingly similar to the numbness she felt at the beginning of the school year. The Quidditch season wraps up – Slytherin takes the cup, because Daphne, for all her faults and for all the drama with Lou, runs a tight ship and has guided them through a solid season – and she doesn’t get to sit next to Lou and listen to her grudgingly agree to that. The good news is that not having practice frees up a lot of Tammy’s late afternoons and evenings, and they spend an awful lot of time in the transfiguration classroom. Final exams are coming up again, and Professor Chang is always hovering around the room, doing lesson prep or grading papers or writing exam questions for the younger kids. Tammy cracks down on the tutoring, very serious, outlining study guides and quizzing her on concepts. This is probably as much for her benefit as Debbie’s; when it comes to Tammy, her test anxiety is something easily recognizable.

The time she doesn’t spend there, or in the library, she takes to spending around the greenhouses again. Her friends do not often go there, and it proves to be a very effective hiding place when they pop up everywhere else. Professor Longbottom puts her to work, and she revels in the productive feeling that comes along with that, the dirt under her fingernails washing away down into the sink after.

He spends the back half of May not pressing for her to tell him why she’s so dead-set on being here. The first Monday in June, there’s a soft knock at the door of the greenhouse where Debbie is repotting Puffapods, and when she looks up, Tammy is framed there, holding a slip of parchment in one hand. “Have you seen Professor Longbottom?” she asks.

Debbie gestures vaguely with a flower pot. “He ran up to the kitchens. He should be back soon.”

“Okay.” Tammy steps inside and looks around as if she’s never been in Greenhouse One before, though Debbie knows for a fact that she has; it’s where all the first years have their herbology lessons. “So this is where you’ve been spending your time, huh?”

She stays until Professor Longbottom gets back, standing abruptly when he arrives before his gaze can linger too long on how close she’s sat down next to the space where Debbie is working. “I just have a note for you from Professor Weasley,” she tells him brightly. She’s forever offering to run errands for her Head of House, something that most sixth-years would consider themselves above. Mostly, jobs like this are for the children a lot newer to Hogwarts. Tammy hands the piece of parchment over, anyway, and spins to smile in Debbie’s direction. “I’ll see you for tutoring after dinner,” she says, and then she’s gone.

Debbie focuses intently on the Puffapods, incredibly aware of the fact that Professor Longbottom hasn’t moved a muscle and is watching her closely. After a moment (or several, she can’t tell), he crosses the greenhouse and sits on the stone wall of the garden bed, close to where Tammy was, but not quite. “Does you being here have anything to do with her?” he asks finally.

Hesitant, she shrugs. “Maybe. Sort of,” she amends. He’s probably the only teacher she would even consider admitting this to, the only one she really believes won’t tell any of the others. “She might be my, um, girlfriend.” And there it is, only the second time she has labeled Tammy in that way, out loud, to someone besides Tammy herself. It brings a tiny smile bubbling up that she can’t entirely hold back, and Professor Longbottom nods without saying anything at all, like he knows she needs the space to be allowed to keep talking. “Most people don’t know, so it’s – it’s complicated. But my friends don’t really like her, so I… I guess I’m here because they haven’t been speaking to me.” At this, he looks at her thoughtfully; she can see the expression out of the corner of her eye, even as she pretends to concentrate solely on the Puffapods. 

He doesn’t look surprised, she realizes, a little belatedly. Chalks it up to Tammy being in here, before, and the man being observant enough to notice she’s been sitting with Lily at the Gryffindor table at meals because nobody else will take her and Lily Potter is infamously kind to misfits.

“Why don’t they like her?”

This is not the question she expects him to ask, although she isn’t completely sure which question she  _ does _ expect. She fumbles and nearly drops a pot, manages to keep a hold on it in the end. “They don’t know her.”

The herbology professor reaches out to take the pot gently from her hands and sets it down off to the side, holds her gaze when she looks quizzically at him. She’s barely half done the task he’s given her. “For what it’s worth,” he says when he has her attention, “I think they would like her, if they gave her a chance. She’s a pretty good one. I’m glad you’re not hiding it anymore.” He catches the way her eyes widen and her mouth opens at that word –  _ anymore _ – and smiles knowingly. “I saw her with the flowers you stole.”

_ Oh. _ So this is why he didn’t look surprised, then – he has known, or suspected, since early on. The flowers were before Christmas; she remembers the way Tammy had two of them tucked into the buttonhole at her collar the next day. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have taken them,” says Debbie reflexively, automatic, feeling the way a little colour drains from her cheeks.

Professor Longbottom waves a dismissive hand. “No, don’t worry about that. What I’m trying to say, Debbie, is that I’m proud of you, and happy for you. I want to make sure you hear that, from somebody.”

— • —

On Friday, after classes, she spreads her books out across a table in the library. She thinks maybe she will simply camp out here for the majority of the weekend, like she tended to last year before her OWLs. Her grades this year will not make it onto her transcript in as official a manner as they did last year, but they will affect what she can and can’t take  _ next _ year for her NEWTs, and the familiar stress is seeping into her bones now that June has hit in full force.

Footsteps cross the floor in her direction, and she doesn’t look up. 

Not until they pause next to her, and when she does finally lift her quill and raise her head, it’s Lou. She looks down at Debbie with her arms crossed and a slight frown pulling at her brows, and this is the closest they’ve been since Hogsmeade, and her fingers shake slightly as she sets her quill down. Other than that, she keeps herself in check. Looks seriously up at Lou, waiting. When no words come out, she sighs through her nose and tilts her head curiously to one side. “Hi. What’s up?”

Lou shifts her weight to her other foot and lets her gaze sweep over the textbooks and parchment strewn across the tabletop. “I was going to say we should talk, but you’re obviously pretty busy.”

It’s maybe a little embarrassing, how quickly Debbie slams her potions textbook shut, but she doesn’t care. “I’m not busy,” she counters.

In any other situation, this would make a tiny glimmer of a smile appear the corners of Lou’s mouth, but not today. She only nods and stacks three books up, one after the other, sliding them closer so Debbie can shove them into her bag. “Okay. Not here, though.”

She leads the way out of the library, down the corridor into an empty room used only to store dusty furniture. The chairs are all piled on top of each other so they cannot sit on any of them, and Lou sinks down to the floor with her back to the wall and her long legs stretched out underneath a desk. Debbie sits across from her, rests her back against a desk leg that digs uncomfortably into her spine. Doesn’t move, though. She wants to be able to see Lou head-on. She clasps her hands together in her lap and waits. Lou gets to call the shots, here.

“I don’t like being lied to, Debbie. Not by you. Lie to anyone else you want, but not us. That’s not how friendship is supposed to work.” She looks resigned as she says it. Debbie isn’t accustomed to seeing her like that.  _ Resigned  _ isn’t a descriptor she would have thought could fit Lou at all. Resilient, maybe, but not resigned. That’s the image that the other girl has always put forth, without fail. “I’m not going to sit here and tell you I would have been on board with this… this you and Tammy thing from the start, because I don’t know. Maybe I would have, maybe not. You have to know, though, finding out like that just stung. I knew there was something you were keeping from us, from me, it was obvious. I just thought, with your mum, maybe you just needed time. If you were just trying to adjust, if that’s all it was. Only then it was more. Like, a lot more.”

“I,” starts Debbie, and she doesn’t even know what she’s going to say, just that it has to be  _ something. _ Something to show Lou that she didn’t mean for it to go that far, that she  _ was _ adjusting, to all the things that came along with losing her mother and gaining Tammy. It occurs to her that whatever exterior Lou presents to the world, nobody really gets to see what it’s shielding from view. Perhaps Debbie has always seen her as this person who can bounce back from anything with a biting smile and a sarcastic comment, but people are more fragile than they appear to be. She’s learned that from herself, from her brother, from her girlfriend. There are always weak sides.

Lou shakes her head, holds up a hand. “Don’t say anything yet. Just let me get everything out,” and Debbie goes quiet, and she heaves a sigh as she gathers up more words to speak. “I get keeping shit to yourself. Obviously you’ve been coming to terms with a lot. But the fact that you felt like you  _ couldn’t  _ tell  _ me _ anything – because you thought  _ I  _ wouldn’t understand any part of it – that’s where we’ve got a problem.” She pauses here, but she’s not done. She’s opening her mouth and closing it again, seeming to fight whether or not to say what comes next, and when one side wins out, it’s not anything Debbie could have prepared herself for. “My parents are splitting up.”

“Wh-what?”

Her voice has gotten smaller, and Debbie leans forward with her elbows on her knees to hear more clearly. “My parents, they’re getting a divorce. That’s why we keep going to Australia. It’s like they thought it would fix all the shit my dad’s been pulling, but it’s not working. They said it’s a last resort, because it’s basically social suicide. You know how purebloods like us don’t  _ do _ that. They fight all the time. About work and where my dad goes at night and and what colour lipstick is on his shirt or who’s perfume he smells like and – and about me. I think they pull it together for holidays because I’m around and we’ve been staying at my grandparents’ in Australia, but it’s still… fucking horrible.”

Debbie’s face falls. Lou doesn’t talk about her parents much, never really has. She keeps it surface-level, will go on endlessly about how much they disapprove of whatever thing she’s done last, but doesn’t go a lot farther. She’s mentioned fights offhandedly, but Debbie has never heard this level of detail, and it doesn’t escape her that even so, it’s still not all laid out for her to see. “I… I didn’t know, Lou.”

Lou snorts. “Of course you didn’t. Everything’s been different, with us.”

She bites down on the inside of her cheek for a moment. “I didn’t mean for it to get like this,” she says in a near whisper.  _ Everything’s been different, with us. _ Lou isn’t wrong, is she? “It’s been so hard, trying to figure out how to navigate things after my mum – well. I felt like nobody else understood exactly what it was like. Like, you guys would try, and that meant a lot, really, but – it’s hard to imagine if you don’t  _ know, _ you know? And I started talking to Tammy at the end of last year, and I thought, she’s been there. So it was easier to talk to her about it, and then it started turning into… into  _ more.  _ I didn’t want to tell anyone at all, and then I wanted to tell you, except there was Daphne, and so I kept putting it off. And the longer I didn’t tell you, the harder it got to figure out  _ how.” _ She leans forward and rests a hand over Lou’s, grateful when the other girl doesn’t pull away immediately. She’s talking too much, too many words, but now that she’s gotten going, it’s almost impossible to cut them off. “I really was going to tell you soon. I told her I was. I told Danny over Easter and it felt  _ good, _ and I was gearing up to talk to you, but then – you know, the Hogsmeade trip, and everything sort of just blew up. I’m sorry,” she says, on a deep breath held for a moment, “for all the secrets.”

She holds Lou’s gaze, dark brown on ocean blue, until Lou nods. “It’s okay. Or it will be,” she says, and that’s enough, for Debbie. “I’m sorry for shutting you out, after. That was sort of shitty. I just… needed a bit of time.”

“It’s okay,” echoes Debbie. She puts her hands on the floor to scoot forward, gets close enough to pull the blonde into a hug. Lou hesitates before she lifts her arms to wrap them tight around her in return, and they sit like that for a while, just holding onto each other, like it can make up for the time they lost not speaking.

Laughing bitterly, Lou says into her shoulder, “It really sucked, not talking to you.”

Debbie releases her but stays close. “It really sucked, not talking to  _ you,” _ she echoes. “No more secrets. I promise.” And she holds out a hand, just the way Tammy showed her, pinky extended. Lou frowns down at the gesture, and she closes her free hand around the other girl’s wrist and lifts her hand up. “It’s a pinky swear. Like an Unbreakable Vow, but for Muggles,” she tries to explain. “Tammy taught it to me before Valentine’s Day, so I wouldn’t be allowed to get her anything.”

Lou shakes her head disbelievingly. “That’s ridiculous,” she mumbles, but links her littlest finger with Debbie’s, anyway. “All right. No more secrets.” She draws her feet in close to stand, brushes dust from her robes, and steps toward the door. “You’re my best friend, Deb, forever. You’re never getting rid of me again, not for a second.”

Debbie matches her steps, one by one, out into the corridor. “I guess I can deal with that.” She slows her steps before they reach the staircase; she can hear the low buzz of people moving down towards the Great Hall for dinner, wants to ask this before they are in anyone’s earshot. “Lou,” she says, tugging on the sleeve of the girl’s robes until she stops and turns to face her. “What made you decide to talk to me now? Today?”

A shrug is all she gets in response, at first. She waits, giving no sign of moving again, until Lou cracks. “Tammy said I should.” Debbie freezes at this admission, eyes widening slightly, opening her mouth to press for more information, but Lou gives it more readily than ever. “Said a lot, actually. She’s been trying to corner me for, like, a week. She seems to think we need each other or something.”

— • —

She walks into the Great Hall with Lou by her side, and it feels like the entire world has tipped back onto its proper axis.

Constance and Nine-Ball occupy seats at the Gryffindor table already, eye them as they approach. Debbie hesitates when they get there, glancing swiftly down the table to where Lily sits before turning back. Her gaze flickers seriously between the two of them, and she speaks up before either of them do. 

“I’m sorry. I just – I guess I’ve had some trouble wrapping my head around everything. It’s been… a lot,” she begins. Maybe things are on their way to okay again with Lou, but she’s hurt Constance and Nine-Ball, too. Constance has been talking to her, but it’s been short and clipped and mostly just because they share a dormitory. “But I don’t ever want to lie to any of you ever again.”

Holding her breath, she remains standing, poised to move away if they want her to. Lou is one thing, but if her other friends are not ready to move forward, she doesn’t want to force it. Constance looks to Nine-Ball, and Nine-Ball takes a slow, concentrated sip of her water, eying Debbie solemnly. “All right,” she says finally, even and unblinking. “Missed you around here, anyway. Don’t do that to us again, yeah?”

Debbie lifts her chin just slightly and lowers it again in a nod. “Yeah,” she agrees.

Constance breaks into a grin, would probably be up out of her seat to spring a hug upon her if she weren’t on the other side of a very long, very wide table. When Debbie sits, though, she nudges their feet together for Debbie’s attention. “It  _ sucks  _ when you guys aren’t talking,” she says, sticking her lower lip out in an exaggerated pout. She does many things that way, larger than life. “Just so you know. I  _ hated _ that.”

She leans forward conspiratorially, eyes locked on the other girl’s, and spears a potato with her fork to transfer it to her plate. “Me, too. Never again, okay?”

The smaller girl clings to her after dinner, all the way back up to Gryffindor Tower, where she pulls Debbie down onto a couch with her and drapes her legs right over her lap. Even if they’ve been talking a little, here and there, since that Hogsmeade trip, it has only been with a cold wall of physical distance. This, it seems, has been incredibly difficult for Constance, who’s decidedly the type of person who lives off of human contact. “Hey, Deb?” she asks, absentmindedly twisting a section of Debbie’s hair into an intricate braid. “Is, you know,  _ this” _ – she drops her voice at that, making a little effort to be subtle – “related to all the sneaking out at night to go for walks?”

Debbie keeps her head very still, so as not to disturb the braiding, as she answers. “Yes. There’s a spot where we, um, go, sometimes.” They’re quiet here, for a moment, which is a relatively rare thing when it comes to Constance. As the other girl ties off the braid, she adds carefully, “I’m probably going to go there tonight. I’ll try not to wake you up.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> excuse me, i'm still just... extra soft about mr neville longbottom and what an angel he is. what the hell. i'm so glad i've been able to include him in this story in a way that felt natural to me, so i hope it's been working for you guys, too! also... _oof,_ that conversation with lou. that made this chapter very difficult to write because it feels like the entire story has been building to the others finding out about debbie and tammy, and their respective reactions – _especially_ lou, of course – and i wanted to make sure to do it justice. did it feel okay to you? let me know what your thoughts are below, if you've got a moment! feedback is like oxygen. it makes me happy and alive.
> 
> i should let you all know that our next chapter, the penultimate one, is unfortunately _not_ coming next week! i'm sorry. i'm going on vacation (!!!) and will be down in california, visiting some of my closest friends, one of whom i've never gotten to meet in person before! i'm really excited and leaving on tuesday, and the only thing i'm a little sad about is that it's going to fuck with my unofficial upload schedule. but we _should_ only be missing one week, and hopefully enough loose ends have been tied up here that y'all won't hate me for leaving you on a cliffhanger or something (because god, imagine if this week-long break was happening directly after the fight with lou in hogsmeade...). so i'll see you in _two_ weeks with chapter 20, i swear!
> 
> as always, thank you so much for reading! i might have forgotten to say that last week in the _massive end-of-chapter note_ i threw at you. paying even the slightest bit of attention to my words and my interpretation of these idiots in a harry potter universe makes me endlessly happy, and i love you all for it!


	20. Chapter 20

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> their exams are lined up one after another so once they start, every single one is a domino falling to hit the next, and there is no room in between to recover or properly prepare herself. tammy gains what might be a permanent cramp in her hand from writing so much, and she lives off coffee and sugar for the full week and two days this keeps her away from the astronomy tower. the closest she gets to debbie is sitting in a desk relatively close to hers because they’re lined up by last name, and by mid-day towards the end of exam period when she gets out of her last remaining exam and there are no more dominos, she’s practically itching to get through the rest of the day, for the sun to go down so she can go to the astronomy tower.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> all right, here i am, as promised: back from vacation and ready for our penultimate chapter! it feels like the end of an era, and i'm trying to wrap my head around that. also, i just need to announce that at least half of taylor swift's new album, lover, is very debtam. cornelia street? daylight? lover? paper rings?! afterglow?! anyway, i'm losing my mind over that. onto the chapter, because i've already made you wait a whole extra week for it and i don't want to put it off any longer!

She’s on a roll with an exam review group in the charms classroom, and skips dinner.

Professor Weasley circles the room, flitting between pairs and small knots of students of all ages, distributing sandwiches from a tray brought up from the kitchen. The evening is a flurry of activity, questions asked and answered by anyone who knows, everyone helping each other, and Tammy feels pride swelling in her chest when two of the kids she’s been tutoring all year – with that one exception back in the fall – teach an entire concept to a handful of first-years.

As curfew approaches, she corrals all of the Ravenclaws out of the room and back up to their common room, where half of them take over the spot near the unlit fireplace to carry on. Exam fever has taken over most occupants of the castle, and Tammy is no exception; she spends the next two hours with her nose buried in a textbook, rereading a chapter for History of Magic.

Unfortunately, exams being so close on the horizon means that people stay up extra-late in the name of studying, and she has to wait for them to retire to bed, one by one, before she can set foot out of Ravenclaw Tower. She weaves through the corridors and down staircases to the base of the astronomy tower and then climbs the twisting steps to the top, willing herself to take her time so she’s not breathing quite so hard when she gets there. Takes a few of the stairs two at a time, anyway, and stops to catch her breath in the doorway.

Debbie has her arms crossed in front of her chest. 

“You talked to Lou,” she says, no preamble. Tammy tries to analyze the words to pick out what the other girl’s reaction is, to determine whether her interference worked at all. Can’t, because Debbie can still wipe everything out of her face and voice if she wants to, becoming effectively unreadable.

There is no point in denying it, though. If Debbie’s going to be mad at her for it, she’s going to be mad. It’s unavoidable, and Tammy decidedly does  _ not _ want to lie to her. Not now, not ever. “Y-yes. I did do that.” She nods, breathless still after all the stairs. “I-I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done it. I just, you know – you were so sad without her, and I thought –”

Stepping closer to her, Debbie reaches up to frame Tammy’s face with her hands. “Shut up,” she whispers, and kisses her to emphasize the point.

With a tiny, soft laugh, Tammy pulls back as far as Debbie will let her. “Are you guys okay, then?” she asks, pressing her fingers in at Debbie’s hips.

A nod, and the girl’s nose brushes Tammy’s in the process. “We’re okay. All of us, actually. Or we’re going to be,” she says, smiling now, and she sounds more hopeful than Tammy thinks she ever has before. She’s missed this, the smiles tugging at Debbie’s mouth and the sparkle it brings to her eyes; it’s been decidedly absent lately, and now that it’s back, it coaxes a matching grin out of her, too. “They’ll probably never let me live it down, but we’ll be okay.”

She catches Tammy in another kiss, and another one after that. Keeps pulling away only to lean in again, smiling the whole time against Tammy’s lips, and God, Tammy feels like she’s flying.

— • —

Their exams are lined up one after another so once they start, every single one is a domino falling to hit the next, and there is no room in between to recover or properly prepare herself. Tammy gains what might be a permanent cramp in her hand from writing so much, and she lives off coffee and sugar for the full week and two days this keeps her away from the astronomy tower. The closest she gets to Debbie is sitting in a desk relatively close to hers because they’re lined up by last name, and by mid-day towards the end of exam period when she gets out of her last remaining exam and there are no more dominos, she’s practically itching to get through the rest of the day, for the sun to go down so she can go to the astronomy tower.

She pushes out of the castle into the sunshine, trailing after her friends. Daphne and Rose walk hand in hand, arms swinging slightly with every step, tethered together as they so often are, and Tammy’s gaze catches on this as they move across the rolling lawn. She saw Debbie at a distance, a few minutes ago, skirting the edge of the school in the opposite direction with her own friends in tow. There are still too many daylight hours between now and the next time she can get close to her. Maybe tonight, she will just hold onto Debbie’s hand until it’s time to go back to bed.

“You good?” asks Amita, and ahead of them, Daphne and Rose look back over their shoulders at the question.

Tammy shrugs. “I’m good,” she replies distantly, but her eyes are still locked on her friends’ joined hands.

There’s a moment where they all follow her sightline, and then Rose smiles softly and whispers to Daphne, who gives that trademarked long-suffering sigh and stops walking. “Okay, yeah, let’s go.” She switches directions abruptly, tugging Rose towards the distant edge of the forest instead of towards the lake, and Amita’s grinning wide, and Tammy digs her heels in and stops.

“Go  _ where?” _

“You’re sort of insufferable when you’re pining, Tam,” Daphne informs her, reaching out for Tammy’s wrist with her free hand. “You’re just so  _ sad.  _ They found this shady spot close to the forest where nobody else really goes. That’s where they’re going.” She doesn’t explain how she knows, and she doesn’t leave Tammy with enough time to wonder for long. She’s strong, pulling Tammy into movement again and keeping her upright when she sort of trips in the process. “Do you want to see your girl, or not? Quick, before I change my mind.”

And that’s how they wind up moving around the corner of the school, all four of them, Daphne keeping a tight hold on her arm the whole time. The dark-haired girl’s sheer determination fuels each step; Tammy is in a kind of daze, it seems, a little shaken by the way her friends have taken this on so suddenly. By the way  _ Daphne _ is the one leading the way – her leading isn’t the odd part, but her leading in the direction of Lou Miller definitely is.

Debbie’s friends see them approaching when they’re still too far away to be in earshot, and Tammy only has eyes for Debbie. She sits on the grass with her back pressed up against a tree, dark hair tumbling down around her shoulders in soft waves, and watches them come very seriously. Doesn’t say a word when they all stop five feet away. She’s doing that thing she did on top of their tower before exams, eyes closed off so Tammy can’t tell what she’s thinking, no matter how hard she tries. Maybe she should have resisted more when this idea came up.

Daphne tosses her hair over her shoulder when they come to a stop, and nobody says anything at all, for a moment. Tammy wishes desperately that her friend would try to look just a  _ little _ less as if she’s simply daring them to tell her to leave. Amita and Rose, at least, have the sense to look nearly as out of place as she feels. She shifts her weight between one foot and the other, back and forth and back again, Daphne’s hand still closed so tight around her wrist that she cannot even consider trying to back away. Locks eyes with Debbie and all she can manage to say, awkward and stilted, is, “Is it – is it okay to be here? Because, um, we can go.” Here, she takes a shallow breath and holds it in her chest.

Eyes tearing away, Debbie looks questioningly to Lou, although Tammy can’t bring herself to follow the other girl’s gaze to see what she’s looking for. She remains poised on the balls of her feet, ready to throw all her strength into pulling Daphne away at a moment’s notice. But then Debbie is looking back to her, mouth pulling upward at one corner, just a little, and her eyes are clearing  _ just _ enough to let Tammy see the cautious excitement sparking there, and she nods.

Hands – she’s not sure who’s – press into her back to push her forward and, embarrassingly, she stumbles on the first step, then collects herself and manages to cross over and sink into the grass next to the Gryffindor girl without any further issues. “Hi,” she says softly, vaguely aware of her friends settling in around this loose circle of people.

Debbie reaches out to lace their fingers together and lets Tammy pull their joined hands into her lap. They have done this a hundred times, familiar movements and touches, but this is different. There are eyes focused in their direction now, a hush amongst all of their respective friends as it happens. “Hi,” she answers.

There is an effort being made here on all sides, and she feels like she’s watching it from a great distance. She has spent so much time dwelling on this, letting all her stress and worry tie itself into knots. They both have, honing in on their concern over how their friends have never gotten along.  _ This _ – Lou and Daphne, six feet apart and trying to see who breaks and says something first, and all the others quiet with bated breath, waiting, too – has been probably the biggest obstacle to cross over all year. Tammy sits still, holding onto Debbie’s hand like a lifeline, taking in the way that the two of them seem to size each other up. They’re both so damn  _ stubborn _ that the silence stretches out for far longer than is comfortable. Even Amita, who’s the most likely candidate to burst into conversation because she can’t stand quiet spaces left unfilled, keeps her lips pressed firmly shut.

In the end, it’s Lou who speaks first. This is fair, Tammy supposes. This way, Daphne took the first step in getting here, and Lou has kind of met her halfway. A compromise, of sorts. When the blonde opens her mouth, Tammy isn’t sure what she’s ready to hear. Maybe a gruff acknowledgement  _ (So you’re cool with this?) _ or another challenge to a duel. But what comes out instead shatters any expectations she could have.

“I actually didn’t mean to hit you with that Bludger last year,” she says, on a slight grimace, like maybe it’s borderline painful for her to admit.

It’s like she’s dropped a bomb, and in the aftermath of it hitting the ground, everything has gone incredibly quiet. The admission sends this small clearing by the edge of the Forbidden Forest plummeting into an even deeper silence than before. The Bludger incident at the end of last season, the afternoon before Tammy first sat with Debbie at the top of the astronomy tower. She doesn’t remember seeing the hit; it was Daphne’s shouting that alerted her to the event afterward. Swiftly, she glances to the girl sitting next to her, and Debbie has this glint in her eye, like she’s known all along. Almost comically, everyone’s faces swivel to Daphne, who has gone as still as a statue. Slowly, carefully, she opens her mouth, then closes it again. “What?” she asks. Tammy doesn’t think she’s ever heard her friend sound quite so startled.

Lou tips her head back to stare up at the sky. It reflects in each iris so they are twice as bright blue. “Don’t make me say it again,” she half-groans. “That was basically torture. I’m just trying to do a nice thing for Deb.”

A predictable eye roll and an even more predictable sigh, and Daphne stretches long legs out in front of her, one arm falling comfortably around Rose’s shoulders. “Okay, sure. I still hate you, you know that?” she says, though it sounds oddly cheerful. “Just to, like, get that out of the way.”

And after that, it’s not so bad.

There is an ease with which Daphne and Rose have settled in around each other in daylight. She has noticed this before, grown accustomed to it, the practice they’ve had at it that she and Debbie haven’t gotten. Tammy watches them for a moment. Rose’s head resting on Daphne’s shoulder, Daphne’s fingers working carefully through blonde curls. They are touching almost always, and she has known it since they started dating and it’s only gotten more and more noticeable now, this year, always making her think distantly – or  _ not so distantly _ – of Debbie. For their part, they have not quite reached that level of comfort anywhere besides the astronomy tower, she thinks. There is a tension in the other girl’s shoulders next to her, a readiness in every muscle to pull her hand away should someone else approach.

But nobody does, and Tammy keeps a hold on her girlfriend’s hand and carefully ensures that she’s not holding on too tight, that she’s leaving Debbie the space and the freedom to reclaim her own hand if she wants to. She twists her upper body slightly to look Debbie head-on, catches her eye purposefully. “Sorry for just… sort of springing this on you,” she says quietly. “It wasn’t my idea – it was Rose, I think – but I… missed you. It’s been weird, not seeing you as much.”

She doesn’t get a real answer; instead of words, Debbie reaches out so her fingertips brush Tammy’s jawline and leans forward to kiss her firmly on the lips. It’s brief, and when she pulls away, Tammy instinctively wavers after her for just the smallest of moments.

There’s a low whistle. Lou, leaning back with her elbows resting on the grass, eyebrow raised pointedly. Someone giggles – maybe Constance, maybe Amita – and Rose positively beams. “You two are very cute,” she announces, twirling one of her curls around her finger. And really, that’s the extent of the reaction.

Everything softens around the edges somehow, now. Amita immediately engages Constance in conversation; the small Gryffindor girl has a deck of Muggle playing cards and an affinity for so-called magic tricks, and has apparently been trying to teach them to a not-particularly-enthusiastic Nine-Ball. Amita joins in with enough energy for the both of them put together, and it turns out they get along quite well. It will take time, Tammy is sure, for her friends and Debbie’s to work out all the little wrinkles and bumps along the way, but she thinks this could  _ work. _ Really work.

This thought brings a smile to her lips. Next year could be a thousand times different than this one, with less secrets and sneaking around, more time spent with Debbie in other places besides just one. There is something reassuring about the way they all fall in around each other like this, without really talking about it, like perhaps the eight of them are meant to meld the two groups together. Undoubtedly, this is a strange thought, considering the animosity between Daphne and Lou, but here they are – in close quarters and  _ not _ at each other’s throats. It gives her hope, the concerted effort they are both making here. Lou has draped her legs across Debbie’s so her feet are close to Tammy’s, and is quite pointedly not directing her gaze at Daphne at all, and Daphne is mostly only paying attention to Rose, but it’s a start.

And a start is all they need.

At some point, Rose pulls her sketchbook out to put final touches on the designs for her dress, and Daphne’s. There is a ball, of sorts, for the graduating class on the last Friday night before the Hogwarts Express takes everyone back home, and she’s possibly been more focused on what she and her date will be wearing than her actual NEWTs lately. She passes the book around for last-minute feedback, a luminous smile on her lips when everyone falls into agreement that they’re beautiful, and pulls Daphne to her feet when it’s time to head back up to the castle for dinner.

Debbie lets go of her hand before they start moving, and it feels like Tammy has lost something vital. She understands, though. There has been so much progress, between telling Danny and talking to Lou and spending half an afternoon together as a group for the first time ever. She can’t expect her girlfriend to be ready to take on that role in the Great Hall, with hundreds of eyes ready to look in their direction. Not yet.

Nobody questions this. They split naturally in half as they round the corner into the open, and inside, Tammy follows her friends to the Hufflepuff table while Debbie’s group occupies a space amongst the Slytherins. “That was nice,” says Rose, smiling softly as she passes Tammy a basket of bread rolls. “You know, Tammy, I’m really glad we did that.”

“It was your idea,” points out Daphne.

Rose tips her chin upward and pretends to look offended. “Yes, well, I can still be glad we did it.” She catches her girlfriend mid-eye roll and smiles brightly at her, anyway. Tammy thinks they are the very picture of the  _ opposites attract _ idea – and yet somehow, they mesh together perfectly, like every little missing piece in one of them is completed by the other.

Rose has one more exam left, and Tammy goes to the library with her. Not because she’s got any studying left to do, but mostly just because she likes the library and the smell of books and the quiet, peaceful hush over the whole place. She leaves her friend to study and weaves her way through the aisles, plucking books off the shelves at random to skim their tables of contents.

From the Quidditch section, she spots Debbie approaching the librarian’s desk, evidently helping Nine-Ball return two towering stacks of books that have built up around the other Ravenclaw’s bed. The other girl nudges Debbie with her shoulder and nods in Tammy’s direction, and then Debbie is striding across the floor towards her, purposeful but trying not to be. She reaches for Tammy’s elbow and pulls her around the corner into a spot harder to catch a real glimpse of, presses her back into the shelf behind her and traps the book Tammy’s holding in between them.

“Hi,” is the only word Tammy can get out before Debbie kisses her. If not for the book still held in her hands, she would be reaching to tangle her fingers in Debbie’s hair. Breathless, she opens under Debbie’s touch like some kind of flower down in the greenhouses, kisses back until someone drops a textbook three aisles over and the sound breaks them apart. “W-what was that for?”

“Just missed you, is all.” Debbie whispers it, smiling as she pulls back. As if they didn’t sit side by side all afternoon, holding hands with sunlight streaming down through the trees at the edge of the forest. “Nine’s waiting for me, though. I’ll see you tonight?”

_ Tonight. _ Tammy nods, heart seeming to rise up into her throat. “Yeah, tonight.” They haven’t been to the astronomy tower since their exams started. Waiting for the right time to sneak out of her dormitory later feels almost torturous, but when she’s sitting up there with her feet hanging out through the rails and her girlfriend next to her, it’s worth it.

Debbie traces a small spiral just above her knee with one fingertip. “Do you think our friends are going to be okay? To do stuff like today more often?” she asks.

Twisting to square her shoulders in the other girl’s direction, Tammy reaches out for both Debbie’s hands at once. “Maybe. I hope so. It was sort of nice today, might actually work out, with them.” She pulls the Gryffindor girl’s left hand up with her right and brushes her lips over her knuckles. Up here, every touch feels natural. Simple and easy, not requiring any extra thought behind it. For a moment, she allows herself to get just slightly carried away by the idea that this feeling could translate downstairs into the rest of the castle. Maybe next year, she can hold Debbie’s hand in between classes and nobody will bat an eye. But she shuts this train of thought down as quickly as it comes; she is leaving that all up to Debbie.

She will wait forever for that, if Debbie wants her to.

— • —

It doesn’t take forever.

On Friday morning, she’s the first one down into the Great Hall for breakfast. There’s a nudge at her shoulder and when Tammy looks up, she freezes. She’s expecting Daphne or Rose or Amita, but instead Debbie stands there, apprehensive, shoulders tensed but determination blazing in her dark eyes. Feigning confidence, she says simply, “Scoot over.” And so Tammy does, feeling a little shell-shocked. Debbie sits down and her right shoulder presses against Tammy’s left, and she doesn’t look directly at her, but this is a step. An unexpected step. A  _ big _ step.

She doesn’t want to make a big deal out of it, sure on some instinctual level that if she draws attention to it, it will never happen again. She likes to think she has gotten to know Debbie Ocean pretty well, peeled back one layer after another to get a little bit of a window into her soul, and this seems like an unquestionably-Debbie sort of thing: To boldly cross over to sit at the Ravenclaw table for breakfast, but have an internal chaos raging the entire time. Visibly, audibly placing her awareness on what’s happening will likely only draw that chaos farther out into the open, and push Debbie back into herself in the process – so Tammy keeps the words from coming out.

She can’t contain her smile, though.

“Hi,” she says softly, and Debbie’s lips tilt upward at the corners. She thinks maybe nobody else around them can see the nervous energy in the set of Debbie’s shoulders, the way her eyes don’t quite meet Tammy’s. But she notices, and it’s okay. She is  _ here. _ She is sitting next to Tammy at breakfast like it’s almost normal, and that’s enough. “Do you want some cereal?”

That’s how their friends find them, when they each trail down one by one. Tammy braces herself for someone to say something, feels Debbie do the same next to her, but nobody does. They just fall in around the two of them, all figuring out how to occupy the space with the same slow, quiet ease they did a couple of days ago. She doesn’t dare to look at anyone past the edges of this suddenly-larger group, with all of their mismatched house colours and years of ignored animosity crackling in the air. They just sit there, the eight of them, paying no attention at all to the rest of the student body and the faculty and the divisions dictated by their houses and their groups’ histories, and it’s  _ nice. _

Her heart feels so full, all the good things might just spill right out of her if she moves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> honestly, this is... the softest chapter of anything i've ever written. it's soft? the whole way through? there's no tragedy or drama? who am i? also, fun fact: i wrote that great hall scene with debbie coming over to the ravenclaw table very, very early on. i usually like to write things in order, but sometimes little pieces pop into my head out of nowhere and i need to get them written down, and then figure out exactly how to fit them into the overall story later on. this particular part was actually written around the time i was working on chapter 2 or 3. like, before they were even friends. god.
> 
> guess what? it's self-promo hours! i have a pinterest board full of concept images for this au, and i think it's really pretty, so if you'd like to take a look at it, you can do so [here](https://www.pinterest.ca/CONNIEBRlTTON/stories-fics/au-hogwarts/)! (also, there are other sections in that board for other au's, some of which miiight happen to be debtam ideas, but we're not going to focus on that too much... yet.) also, i've got a spotify playlist [here](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/10VSTReRtpaYEGT4XaCerK?si=kGZkXi7oQBKGL8-_XS_6gg)! i listened to it a lot while i was writing this whole fic, so let's just call it a soundtrack. that i may or may not continue to add things to, if they fit.
> 
> as always, thank you for reading, and for sticking around while i took a week off! only one chapter left, and i really hope the ending of this story closes off in a way you enjoy! i'll see you for that last chapter next weekend, probably!


	21. Chapter 21

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this is their last night on the astronomy tower until seventh year. the train will be winding its way back into the city tomorrow, after breakfast, and then it will be summer, officially. it feels like the end of an era, something big and important. it didn’t feel like this, last year. then again, last year was different – her world hadn’t been dipped into chaos and st mungo’s trips for the summer just yet, and tammy was nothing more than an awkward and hesitant connection half-bordering on friendship, but not quite.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh, my god... we've made it. this is the second multi-chapter fic i've ever managed to finish writing _and_ posting, and every person reading this is so important to me for that! i wouldn't have this entire story here if it weren't for you reading each chapter and the wonderful comments i've received throughout the whole process. thank you from the bottom of my heart! i love youuu.

They spend most of the day lying on their backs on the other side of the lake, directly across from the castle, and the sun shines down over them like a bright spotlight on everything.

There is nobody close enough to see them except for their friends, and Debbie reaches for Tammy’s hand so their fingers interlock. She likes this, she thinks: Being able to casually touch Tammy in some way out in the open, even if she only feels ready to do so around a handful of people. It’s as if a weight has lifted up off her shoulders and she’s nearly floating through the hazy June afternoon.

Rose moves around to each and every one of them before she and Daphne go inside to put on their beautiful dresses, and kisses everyone swiftly on the cheek like she’s been friends with all of them forever instead of only half. Tammy releases her hand to hug the older girl tight, and there’s an overwhelming sadness welling up in her eyes. Like it’s finally hitting her, suddenly, out of nowhere, that Rose is graduating. They’ve been friends for years now and Tammy does not like to feel as if she’s losing people, Debbie knows. She can hear the Hufflepuff whispering to her, is close enough and Rose is bad enough at keeping her voice down properly for that. “I’m going to come visit every Hogsmeade trip, and I’ll write to you like your mum does. You’re  _ not _ losing me.” It turns out that for someone as disorganized and preoccupied as she is, Rose Weil can be incredibly perceptive, when she tries to be. Maybe Debbie doesn’t know her well, but she, too, feels some profound sense of loss here; she is gaining Tammy’s friends, now, only she doesn’t feel like she has nearly enough time to get to know this one.

She watches Rose and Daphne circle the lake back towards Hogwarts, linked hands tying them together even in the face of life moving forward. There is something inspiring about that, the glimmer of it against all her fears of change. Come September, they will have something to keep them apart: Rose will have an adult life to begin and Daphne will be stuck here for another year. She catches herself wondering about next year, about what she and Tammy will do after they graduate, whether they will be as inseparable as Danny and Tess, or if they will be like Rose and Daphne, obstacles cropping up in between them.

“Do you think they’re going to make it?” she asks Tammy, later. This is their last night on the astronomy tower until seventh year. The train will be winding its way back into the city tomorrow, after breakfast, and then it will be summer, officially. It feels like the end of an era, something big and important. It didn’t feel like this, last year. Then again, last year was different – her world hadn’t been dipped into chaos and St Mungo’s trips for the summer just yet, and Tammy was nothing more than an awkward and hesitant connection half-bordering on friendship, but not quite.

Tammy hums thoughtfully. “You know, I think they will. They love each other a lot. If anyone can handle distance, it’s them,” she muses.

“What about us?”

She can feel Tammy stiffen at the quiet question, at the uncertainty in her voice. There is a tense silence, and she doesn’t answer the question when she breaks it. “What about us?” she echoes back, and that’s it.

“Do you think you and me can handle distance?” presses Debbie. She shouldn’t, but she does. The question has been sticking in her mind since the lake earlier, all through the rest of the afternoon, and coming into the Entrance Hall to see Rose and Daphne’s dresses when they came down, and reading one of her mother’s books next to Constance in the common room. It has trailed after her all the way through the corridors and up to this spot,  _ their _ spot. She used to think it was  _ her _ spot, until last year. Now it is permanently attached to Tammy, intertwined with every thought of the girl in her head.

“Of course we can.” Tammy is looking at her seriously, eyes wide. Her hair is tied back in a braid again tonight, and instead of looking directly back at her, Debbie’s gaze traces the line of it down over her shoulder. “We’re going to write all summer, and maybe we can figure something out to see each other a bit, too. I have a lot of things I want to do with you.”

It’s not exactly what Debbie meant – she meant  _ next _ summer, graduation and everything after that – but she tries to let the words reassure her, anyway. She curls her fingers around the back of Tammy’s neck and draws her in, kisses her smoothly until all the follow-up questions flood right out of her mind. All that’s left to think about, then, is Tammy and her mouth and skin and hair, storing up every last feeling and pocketing them all for safekeeping. She shifts to hover over the blonde and presses her lips down the column of her neck, brushing her braid out of the way, and lets the girl’s hands trail soft across her spine. Lets all the things about Tammy that are so  _ calming _ chase away all the concerns she’s holding onto.

The carriages transport the entire student body down to the platform the next morning, and she is sure that this will be the end of all the time her friends and Tammy’s have been pushing themselves to spend around each other. After all, there is no way for the eight of them to cram themselves comfortably into one compartment, and that provides the perfect excuse to call a stop to it altogether. 

But they board the train and, surprisingly, it is Lou and Daphne who claim compartments directly across from one another, purposefully leaving the sliding doors open so they can cross back and forth across the tiny, unsteady corridor down the middle, effectively turning it into one giant compartment. She’s certain that the resulting noise levels bother everyone else, but nobody even attempts to quiet them. Tammy and Amita are in and out for their patrol shifts up and down the length of the train, and when Tammy returns, it’s with John Frazier on her heels.

“Can I speak with you?” he asks, eyes flitting between her and Debbie, and he leads them both to the other end of the train car to stand in the windy spot between this one and the next, where nobody else can hear. He gestures behind himself in the direction of their friends. “I don’t know what kind of magic you’ve worked on those two, but I swear, I’ve never seen them even attempt to get along like this. I just wanted to say, you know, thanks. On behalf of the future Head Boy or Girl and probably the whole staff.”

“We didn’t do anything,” Debbie objects, and Tammy jabs her side pointedly with one elbow. “I mean, you’re welcome, I guess.”

Before he goes, he smiles at them – beams, really – and his eyes crinkle up at the corners, a dimple in each cheek. When he’s happy, it shows. It’s easy to catch onto. “I think this is nice, by the way. That the two of you are… whatever you are. I don’t know where you’re at on all of it, but I’m still not telling anyone.” He pauses, clasps his hands together in front of him and surveys them with interest. “It’s just nice, is all,” he finishes, a little awkwardly, and then disappears into the next car to continue on his rounds.

They stay there for a few more minutes, holding onto the safety rail for balance as the Hogwarts Express curves around a wide bend. Debbie’s head spins. How many people will be like John, awkwardly sharing their approval when they find out about her and Tammy? Will it be like that forever? Only a handful of people know, now. The important ones, for the most part. She thinks she’d like to keep it that way for now – doesn’t feel ready to deal with sentiments like John’s coming from all directions just yet, would rather let people adjust to this oddly-large mashup of their friends before tackling that hurdle. She tells Tammy this here, has difficulty in getting the words out because the wind whips them away too quickly.

“It’s okay, Debbie,” she promises. Maybe she’d press her lips to Debbie’s here or reach for her hand, if they weren’t so visible to anyone who looks this way. “I’ll take this part as slow as you want to. Tomorrow or next month or next year or never, remember?”

Inside, Debbie squeezes herself into the space between the window and Lou. “Are you still staying here for the summer?” she asks.

Her best friend shrugs. They’re so close together that it makes Debbie move, too. “Yeah, far as I know,” she answers steadily. There are guards in her eyes, a note of warning in her voice, but Debbie has no intention of broadcasting their private conversation from that unused classroom.

She slides an arm around Lou’s shoulders and drops her tone to a low murmur. “Okay. You’re going to write, and I’m going to see you.” She doesn’t phrase it as a question, states it this way on purpose, like she’s letting Lou know there’s no getting out of it. Pressing her nose in close to the blonde’s ear so her words are even more geared only to her, she adds, “Whatever happens, I’m around to talk, you know that? No matter what.”

Lou shuts her eyes and grabs her hand blindly, squeezes Debbie’s fingers in acknowledgement. “Love you, babe,” she says, and leaves it at that. They don’t need to say anything else.

Danny and Tess are late getting to King’s Cross – she can’t see them anywhere – but they group their trunks together on the platform and sit on top of them while they wait, owls in cages by their feet. She sits in between Tammy and Lou, and allows a few seconds to marvel over this fact. That she’s got her girlfriend on one side of her and her best friend on the other, and that it’s going  _ well. _

The crowds of people around them part to reveal everyone’s parents, one by one, and there are twice as many people to hug goodbye as there has ever been before. Rose is a hugger, of course, and starts this off when her family appears. “Don’t be a stranger,” she tells Debbie, who feels a rush of affection for her, this girl she’s barely begun to be friends with, who has welcomed her and the others with open arms and a cheerful smile. “And keep an eye on Tammy for me. She needs someone looking out for her, too.”

Constance goes next, engulfed in a messy group embrace by the siblings too young to have received their Hogwarts letters yet. “Okay, okay, let me breathe, guys,” she laughs, fighting her way out to bestow fleeting hugs on Debbie and the others. Her eyes sparkle as she releases Tammy. “You’re cool, dude,” she says, which is about as emotional as she’s going to get, outwardly. She stops and turns to wave a couple times before disappearing entirely into the sea of people around them.

Even Daphne goes along with the friendly goodbyes; she doesn’t hug anyone besides Tammy and Amita, but she stops in front of Debbie and looks her over from head to toe deliberately. “I’ve got to give you a little credit, Ocean, you’re not so bad,” she admits, and it’s not exactly a compliment, not really, but Debbie finds herself smiling, regardless.

“Thanks. You’re not so bad, yourself.”

Lou gives a quiet snort at that, but manages to look serious when the other Slytherin girl turns to look at her. “You’re bearable, Kluger,” she allows, and it’s like they’ve taken ten steps forward.

Veronica bursts out into the open through a disgruntled group of Hufflepuffs, just after Daphne and her parents are out of sight.  _ “Leslie,” _ she calls, gesturing wildly as she screeches to a halt in front of them. “You’re really just sitting here? Mum and Dad are over there, let’s  _ go.” _ Nine-Ball doesn’t get much of a chance to say goodbye to any of them – her little sister’s hand has closed around her elbow to tug her up onto her feet, and the most she seems to be able to manage is a halfhearted wave. Just the lift of her other hand, really, and a grab at the handle of her trunk to pull it along with her.

Anita’s mother, as it turns out,  _ hovers.  _ She greets Tammy with a smile but eyes Debbie distrustfully (“She doesn’t like new people much,” Tammy whispers), and spends several minutes fussing over her daughter. The clothes she wears, the hair not tied back out of her face, and Debbie thinks she can  _ feel _ the frustration rolling off Amita in waves. She manages to contain the eye rolls until her mother turns her back to find a luggage trolley, and then leans in close to sigh and say, “She’s going to spend the whole summer telling me I’ll never get married. Wish me luck.”

Placing both hands on the girl’s shoulders, Tammy looks at her solemnly. “Good luck.”

And then it’s just the two of them, Debbie and Tammy, sitting side by side on top of their school trunks with a little space in between them, like they’re back to the early nights on the astronomy tower, overlooking everything. Like they need that space, the boundary line drawn down the middle. Debbie leaves it there purposefully, and the other girl doesn’t make an attempt to cross it. Not in front of everyone. They are quiet, melting into the background of the noise and activity on all sides. She thinks a part of Tammy’s calming aura from their place on that tower has followed along, all the way here, leaving her to feel far more comfortable than she automatically imagined she would.

Tammy’s back straightens abruptly, and she shifts her feet in anticipation. “There’s my mum,” she says in a low voice, and is on her feet even before Debbie can properly register the words. Nerves sweep over her, anxiety buzzing through each one of her veins as she watches the woman emerge from the crowd and wrap her arms tightly around Tammy. She has seen Tammy’s mother from afar before, but never up close. From a distance, they don’t look as alike as they do now, when there are exponentially more details readily available. From here, she looks like her daughter, though her hair is darker and her eyes are different. Maybe it’s just the perpetual air of tiredness she gives off, and the kindness etched into every line of her face. She holds onto Tammy for a long moment, and looks expectantly to Debbie, after that. Twisting her fingers together, Tammy mumbles, “Uh, Mum, this is Debbie.”

“Debbie,” repeats her mother. She smiles bright, and it’s so much like Tammy’s that it throws her off, if only momentarily. “I’m Abby. I’ve been hearing a lot about you, you know. It’s nice to finally meet you.”

Questioningly, she breaks eye contact to look at Tammy. Tammy, whose eyes have gone wide with pink flooding in at her cheeks.  _ “Mum,” _ she hisses. She wavers closer to Debbie for a moment, so their arms press together. “I-I told her about you at Christmas. I’m sorry. I just had to talk to  _ someone, _ and –”

A few months ago, or  _ at  _ Christmas itself, this would have made Debbie freeze up immediately. She would have let fear paralyze her at the simple thought of this woman knowing something about  _ her and Tammy _ before Debbie herself even knew how to open herself up to it. But she’s come a long way, or at least some way, and she cuts the other girl off by holding out her hand for an official, rather formal handshake. “It’s nice to meet you, Abby,” she replies. Abby shakes her hand, perhaps a little bemused, and then pulls Debbie in for an abrupt hug. She’s startled by this, rattled a little: The easy manner in which a woman accepts her, and the motherly way she holds onto Debbie, as if she wants to remind her what it feels like.

It’s around now that Danny and Tess arrive, and there is a flurry of introductions made as he swings her trunk onto a cart. Abby shakes both of their hands, too, and Debbie watches, feeling like her heart has leapt up into her throat. There is no turning back now, no denying that this is real. Their friends know, their families know, and here they are at King’s Cross, and her girlfriend’s mother is making small talk with her brother. It’s all easy, fluid grins as she glances sideways at Tammy with a tiny glimmer of a smile playing at her lips.

If this is a glimpse of her future, it could be nice. It could be  _ good. _

Before they part ways, Abby pulls Debbie into another quick hug, and this time, she’s got enough presence of mind to lift her arms and hug the woman back. “If you need anything, you just let us know, all right?” she says, maybe a little mysteriously. She drops her voice before she adds, “I think you’re good for her. I haven’t seen her this sort of happy in a while.”

Merlin, she wants to kiss Tammy goodbye, but she can’t. Not here, not now. Instead, she holds out one hand with the littlest finger raised up.  _ An Unbreakable Vow, but for Muggles. _ “See you soon,” she says.

When Tammy links their pinkies, she smiles, lips curving upward. Her eyes light up when she does, and it brings an answering smile to Debbie’s face. “Yeah, I’ll see you soon.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whew. it's over! as always, thank you for reading, and like i said up above – this story wouldn't exist, if not for each and every one of you! if you enjoyed it in literally any way, you're the reason i wrote it. i literally cannot say thank you enough times.
> 
> i have a lot more things in progress, so if you'd like to hear about them a little, please keep up with me on twitter (@deboceans), where i yell a lot about fictional characters and, right now, taylor swift's new album and sarah paulson's character in the goldfinch. keep an eye out for upcoming projects, because there are a _lot_ of them, and i'm absolutely not finished with debtam!
> 
>  
> 
> __  
> **ps: ...09.28.19**  
> 


End file.
